A Future Not Like the Past
by Shadow Master
Summary: BtVS/Smallville/Marvel Comics/Other There are some beings in this galaxy that have a destiny. Destiny is often confused with Fate and therefore seen as unchangeable. However while unchangeable it is not without revision as you will see...
1. Chapter 1

"A Future Not Like the Past" By Shadow Master aka Ryley Breen

(BtVS/Smallville/Others)

email: Ryley[underscore]Breen[at]hotmail[dot]com

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the copyrighted materials contained herein. They are the rightful property of their creators and associated companies. I make no money off of this whatsoever. I write only for my own enjoyment and for those readers who enjoy my work. Therefore please don't consider suing me or anything because I can guarantee that the legal costs of such proceedings would vastly exceed anything you could possibly get from me.

_A Future Not Like the Past_

_**August 29**__**th**__**, 1980**_

_**Outside Sunnydale General Hospital, Evening**_

"What are we going to do now, Tony?" Jessica asked as they got into their 1980 Honda Accord.

"I don't know, Jess. We'll just keep looking and asking around." He replied comfortingly as he pulled out of the parking spot, "We'll find something. We just gotta be patient."

It bothered him to see his wife of three years so upset and it was because of that that he'd done his best to support her in her quest to have a son. It had been something Jessica had always been thinking about since the day he'd gotten down on bended knee and proposed to her. He, on the other hand, hadn't been all that crazy about having a kid, or at least not until he had a chance to make something of himself on the worksite. Maybe once he was promoted to vice president of the Sunnydale branch of the company he'd be willing to put as much effort into making a kid as Jessica was. After all, by then he'd have enough money to handle raising a kid without having to sacrifice anything else that he might want. At the moment he had just plunked down a sizeable sum of money for his own house and the car they were driving in and he still had payments to make on both. If a kid got dropped in their laps at this point he'd have to stretch each dollar that little bit further and maybe sign on for some overtime when it became available.

Not exactly how he wanted to spend his leisure time.

"I know, Tony. It's just… it's just that I want a child of my own so much." Jessica said, looking like she'd break down into tears eventually if something didn't turn her mood around.

"Look, how about we try to turn this night into something more positive?" He said, trying to sound sympathetic and caring, "Let's go to the drive in theater outside of town. It'll be like old times. What do ya say?"

For a moment he thought she'd be determined to sulk or something but, when he saw that special twinkle in her eye, he knew that he had her hooked on the idea. With that in mind he turned onto the road that would take them out of Sunnydale itself and to the drive in theater that had been there since the sixties. It had been the place where many… pleasurable… memories had been made.

Most of which had involved Jessica. The more recent visits there, anyways.

There had been other women before her, of course, what woman could resist him after all, but in the end he knew that the image of a playboy and skirt chaser wouldn't be good for his career in the company. So he'd taken a look at his little black book, looked for the ones with the fewest cons and then made a choice he felt he could live with. She had a great body, one that seemed less likely to be ruined by pregnancy every day, she had a sense of humor that could occasionally make him laugh and, best of all, her family was always a soft touch when it came to asking for a loan. They were such 'good people' that all he needed to do was tell an appropriately tailored sob story and add the promise that there was a plan in the works to get him and his wife back on their feet. Twice before he'd done it and they hadn't hesitated one little bit. He knew he'd have to wait awhile before doing it again, didn't want to tip them off that they were being taken advantage of, but if a miracle happened and Jessica got pregnant then he could look forward to an early Christmas bonus this year.

That had him smiling in a way that might have tipped his wife off to his 'ambitious nature'.

Not that he couldn't explain it away if she caught him in the act somehow.

Jessica could be so blind to the truth sometimes.

Space.

It was a big place with an abundance of things going this way and that.

For those that dwelt in the solar system of Earth, though, things were more predictable with eight planets, several moons and an asteroid belt. Of the planets, only Earth had signs of intelligent life on the surface and so it had been for the last couple of centuries. The inhabitants of Earth, for most of their history, remained ignorant of what lay beyond their own planet and used mysticism as well as religion to explain what lay in the sky above them. In the last twenty years or so they have begun to take their first steps into the great darkness of space first by escaping Earth's gravity and then by landing on the moon. Plans upon plans were being conceived by agencies all over the world, by all of the major governments of the world, to expand into outer space so that see all there was to see. At the moment, though, space technology was still in its infancy and, aside from an array of orbital satellites or experimental probes, not much else had been put to practical use… with a few unofficial exceptions, if certain conspiracy newspapers could be believed.

Whatever the truth may have been, it is safe to say that no one could have predicted what was about to happen. Where once there was nothing but an empty vacuum, light collected before exploding outwards to reveal a hole in space wider than most small cities. A collection of blue and white lights surrounded a hole that seemed to lead to a realm that was a kaleidoscope of colors that changed from one nanosecond to the next. However if anyone was watching this event, they would soon have their attention focused on something else as a craft surrounded by planetary debris exited the portal with a brief surge of speed before assuming a more consistent pace. Passing by the Earth's moon, the craft's course seemed to change, though whether it was due to gravitational fields or a program on the space fairing vessel was unknown. All that could be said with certainty was that due to this change in course the craft was now heading directly for Earth rather than veering off elsewhere.

In another time, another place, the ship would have continued on its preprogrammed course to land just outside of a small town in the state of Kansas. Indeed that had been the plan of the ship's creator but even his sizeable scientific acumen could not completely predict how things would develop after his visit there as a young man. While being a citizen of an advanced scientific society, even he could not account for every variable and phenomena with one hundred percent accuracy. Therefore it could be forgiven that he failed to predict a flash of cosmic energy seriously destabilized the craft's systems, destabilizing its trajectory. As a result it was unable to avoid one of the larger satellites orbiting the planet, resulting in a collision that knocked the spaceship completely off course so that it now flew towards the west coast of the United States of America.

As for the planetary fragments that had once been following the craft like the tail end of a comet with the energy disruption of the craft's systems, the force that was keeping the masses of rock and crystal in close to the ship was gone. Without it the fragments were dispersed by the collision with the orbiting satellite scattering in all directions to fall to Earth in random locations around the globe. Some would touchdown both in bodies of water while others would make landfall on continents around the world. Some would be found within days of their arrival on Earth while others would remain unreachable due to various natural environmental barriers, such as thousands of feet of solid rock.

As for the ship itself, it entered the atmosphere with the debris that had followed it and was enveloped by fire as the friction began to build.

For those on the ground it would appear to be nothing more than a meteor shower and be dismissed as a pretty light show. Travelling at great speeds it traversed mesosphere in minutes, entering the stratosphere and losing the red glow it once had. Had anyone been tracking the trajectory of the craft they would have been able to calculate its touchdown point to be somewhere within range of Santa Barbara and Ventura counties in the state of California.

However there was one thing unknown to all and that was the fact that there existed a special energy field that surrounded the town that would have been at ground zero of the impact. Thus, instead of landing in the town, it skipped off the field to land outside the town limits.

The town limits of a place known as Sunnydale, California, USA.

_**A Gas Station Just Outside of the Sunnydale City Limits, Jessica's P.O.V**_

_I wish Tony would hurry._ Jessica thought as she waited in the car for her husband, _Honestly! How much beer is he planning on getting in there?_

They were about three quarters of the way to the old drive in that held such wonderful memories for them both and then her husband had said he wanted to stop to get some 'refreshments'. She, of course, had pointed out that there was a concession stand at the theater but Anthony had pointed out that the people there watered down every drink and charged outrageous prices. Thinking back on the previous visits, she had to concede that he might have a point and so she didn't put up too much of a fuss when he'd pulled into the gas station. Now, though, she was beginning to get a little impatient since they'd miss the movie if he took much longer.

She was about to get out of the car to see what was taking him so long when she heard a muffled sound from inside the car that she imagined had to have been pretty loud for those outside. Curious, her mind deduced that the sound seemed to have been made behind her so, with a little maneuvering in her seat, she turned around to see what was behind the car. It was then, only for a split second, that she saw a dark shape shoot towards the gas stationed from the direction of Sunnydale. Anything else became incomprehensible as the ground shook, the car was thrown into the air and fire seemed to expand in all directions before adopting a more vertical burn behavior. She, of course, was only peripherally aware of all this since being tossed around the interior of her car but, when her mind finally became coherent enough, she wondered if she'd somehow been dropped in a war torn country. Flaming debris lay everywhere and, amidst the crackling of the fires, she could hear cries of both pain as well as panic cutting through the air with all the subtlety of a chainsaw. Realizing that the car was upside down, she painfully began to crawl out of the shattered driver's side window of the car trying her hardest not to cut up her palms.

Painfully getting to her feet, she was glad that she didn't seem to have any broken bones but she was pretty sure that when she and Tony got home, she'd be covered with bruises. Looking about, she could see that she was one of the 'lucky' ones as there were many more people scattered about, either dead or dying. Some looked as though they were just asleep but the lack of rising and falling told her those people were dead. The others… the others made her throw up everything she had in her stomach.

There was so much blood, such gore, that it took everything she had to bring herself under control. Doing her best to focus on something other than the death, she looked at the surrounding area instead and began to describe it inside her mind. The gas station was completely destroyed, parts of it either aflame or reduced to shattered rubble. The pumps were now columns of fire reaching for the sky and the garage portion was almost completely blown away. There was a chance that there were still people alive in the store portion of the gas station but they'd have to dig themselves out or push aside the debris to step outside. It was difficult to see but she could sort of make out where the destruction began and where it ended. A flash of memory reminded her of the dark shape she'd seen heading in the general direction of the gas station before the car was knocked about with her inside it.

So something had crashed… crashed through the gas station… and set off all this destruction.

She was about to make her way to the store portion of the gas station when a sound reached her ears that froze her in place better than any block of ice could. It was a sound she'd dreamed about ever since Tony had proposed to her and it had only gotten more dominant in her mind as the years had gone by. She'd been discouraged after the first few trips to the doctor made the likelihood of her bearing a child less and less likely. She didn't understand half of the technical mumbo jumbo that had been rattled off but the basic gist that she got was that she'd been born wrong somehow. She didn't give up, though! She grabbed onto any experimental treatment that the doctor named, any possible way she could have a child, and Tony had been supportive every step of the way. Today, however… today it was nothing more than her own stubborn will that kept her going because the part of her ruled by reason had pretty much given up. She knew that her husband would keep on trying so long as she made it clear she wanted to keep going but, from the way Doc Reeves was talking earlier, it sounded like almost all of the experimental treatments had been explored. It was because of this that she'd welcomed the distraction of a trip to the drive in because then, for at least a few hours, she could ignore the truth creeping up behind her.

Now, though, the crying of a baby had shattered her forced repression and immediately her only objective became to find the source of those innocent cries. While some might say that amidst the chaos of the scene around her it would be near impossible to track something down by sound alone, she was the exception to that rule. When someone has wanted something for an extended period of time, they become significantly attuned to its characteristics: its sounds, its smells and the form it took. Thus, because of her desire for a child, she had very little difficulty at all tracking the scared crying to the bottom of a trench in the field that existed to the left of the gas station. With her destination clearly pointed out to her, she broke into a run, only stumbling once along the way, quickly arriving at the source of the cries.

The sight she beheld then was enough to make all but the fuzzy feeling disappear as her heart melted.

Wriggling at the bottom of the trench was a lovely, naked baby boy.

"Oh my!" she exclaimed as she dashed to baby's side scooping him up in her arms in an instant, "You poor baby!"

So great was her focus on the baby that she completely ignored the metal impression it had been lying in or its seemingly artificial nature. Given time she might have taken a closer look and begun to ask questions about what the scorched metal and overall shape meant.

"Jessica! JESSICA!"

Turning and moving towards where her husband was, she didn't even think about putting the child back down. Indeed, any thoughts she might have had about where she found it vanished into the ether of her mind, where it would die a slow death over the course of many years.

It didn't take her long to find her husband, who was taking steps her way to try and find her. It looked like he had injured his right arm but, judging from the lack of blood, it didn't seem to be too serious. Then again she didn't have any medical training outside of a few First Aid classes she'd taken back in university, so what did she know? It didn't take Anthony long to lock eyes with her and then, within the space of fifteen seconds they were embracing each other, glad that the other was still alive. However the hug didn't last long though as the baby in her arms cried out, getting both her attention as well as the attention of her husband.

"A baby? Where did you find him?" Tony asked obviously confused as to what she'd be doing with an infant.

"Over there in the field. Oh, he was crying! He sounded so afraid!" she exclaimed as her mind began to focus on the precious thing in her arms, "But it's alright now. Mommy's here now!"

"Jessica! You can't just call this boy yours," Tony said, sounding unsure of how to speak about this subject. "He has to belong to someone here. If we just take him they could charge us with kidnapping or something."

While the more rational part of her mind acknowledged that it was quite likely the baby's family was among those people at the gas station, her growing attachment to the infant ruthlessly tried to suppress those facts so that all she cared about was making her dream come true.

"Not if his parents are one of the dead. Tony, I found him in the field without any clothing on or anything to tell us who he belongs to," she said, trying to come up with reasons why the boy belonged with them. "Besides, what sort of parents leave their child naked and alone! They don't deserve him!"

Her husband seemed to battle with himself for a time, caught between obeying the law and giving her what she wanted, but it didn't take him long to reach a decision.

"Alright! We'll take the child home with us **BUT** we'll also keep an eye on the news broadcasts and the papers," Tony said with firmness that made it clear he would not be moved on this. "If we read or see so much as a peep about a family missing a baby boy that looks like this one, we'll turn him over. Okay?"

She wanted to argue further but she knew from looking into Tony's eyes that if she put up any further fuss he'd abandon his compromise in a heartbeat.

With that in mind there was only answer she could give. "Okay," she replied with a smile on her face as she looked down at the infant that Fates willing would be hers from this day forward.

_**One Month Later, Sunnydale, Tony's P.O.V**_

_Damn deadbeat parents!_ Tony thought as he sat on a stool in his favorite bar, enjoying a mug of his favorite brew, _Dumping their baby out there! Now it's my problem!_

It had been bearable enough that first week, since Jessica had taken all the responsibility for caring for the baby, but once one week turned into two things began to cost him. Jessica insisted on getting clothes for the child and then real baby food rather than whatever they could find around the house. As the money left his pocket, he'd doubled his viewing of the news broadcasts and reading of newspapers so that if there was a single mention of a missing child he'd spot it. As of last week though he'd lost hope on the media providing him with what he wanted so he bought Stein a round one night and covertly asked if he'd heard anything.

He'd cursed himself all the way home with fifty less dollars in his pocket thanks to that asshole of a beat cop stringing him along.

Now… now it looked like the child Jessica had named Alexander would really be their child from that day forward. Considering the doctors had told him that his arm wouldn't have full range of motion anymore and that meant he'd have to work twice has hard at work just to stay where he was, it was going to be a drain on his bank account and, while he didn't think he'd lose the house or the car now, that it was repaired it'd be pretty rare to have a night out with the guys.

Especially since he was going to have to come up with some fake documents in order to make everything legal concerning the brat. They had, after all, had them in their house for a month without telling the police or anyone else so they had probably broken a few laws or something. Therefore to keep away from some prison time, they had to make sure all the paperwork and records supported their claim that the brat was theirs. The problem wasn't that he didn't know how to do it but, rather, that he knew the people who could do that sort of work would try to bleed him dry for their trouble. This being the case, he had to wonder if keeping Jessica happy by letting her keep the baby had really been the smartest thing. It'd seemed like a lucky break the failed attempts at getting her knocked up the normal way but now it looked like it was going to cost him more money.

Hearing the tinkling, he turned to the door of the tavern and saw the bar owner's son, William, entering in looking like he was a little worried. Not surprising considering the kid was in his late teens and, if the clock was anything to go by, was late for his shift at the bar. The kid was a spineless coward who'd probably never amount to anything and might not even be left the bar unless he grew a pair sometime soon. Franklin was an old friend from 'Nam and couldn't stand wimps or cowards at all. On the battlefield those kinds of people were shot on sight both by their comrades and by the enemy. They were burdens and liabilities that needed to be cut loose at the first sign of trouble or the whole squad would fall to enemy fire. His buddy said that William was so weak because the old ball and chain babied him too much and always got in the way when he tried to whip the kid into shape. He'd already promised himself in his soul that he wouldn't let Jessica get in the way of making Alexander into a proper man, no matter how much he might love her. The men of the Harris family had always been fine examples of what it meant to be a guy and he'd kill the brat before he'd let Alexander bring shame to that fine tradition.

"Sorry I'm late, Pops." William said as he tied on his bar tender's apron.

"Sorry? SORRY? You're half an hour late and you think **sorry** is going to be enough to get you through everything I've had to do to cover for you?" Franklin asked incredulously before punching his boy in the gut without any warning, "Don't think for a minute that I'm going to cut you any slack just because you're my son! The moment you stepped into this place, you became just another hopeless employee I've generously decided to let work for me. You got that, runt!"

"Y-yes… B-Boss!" William replied, scraping himself off the floor and back onto his feet.

"Then get your lazy ass in back and check the stock! I don't want us running dry anytime soon." Franklin ordered before giving his son a kick in the ass to get him to hop to it.

He could only shake his head at the weakness the lazy bum had in him and wondered if his buddy would disinherit the trash altogether.

"Fuck but that boy pisses me off! Makes me glad I'll be getting a windfall soon so I can leave this dirtball of a town," Franklin said before he went back to cleaning the mugs in front of him.

"Windfall? What windfall?" he asked, wondering what big scam his buddy was talking about.

"Well…" replied Frankie before taking a quick look around, "There's this guy that goes by the name of 'Doc' that works outta the warehouse district. Does all kinda weird word for weird people. Anyways, he's willing to pay quite a bit of money for people willin' to do guard duty on a couple of shipments he's got coming in by boat on the beach."

"How much they payin'?" he asked, wondering if this might be a chance for him to earn some extra money.

"Ten thousand per night, grand total of forty if you make it through all four nights." Franklin replied with a smile, "Quickest pile of cash I'll ever make, that's for sure. You interested?"

Was he interested? Forty grand would certainly cover the cost of the fake papers he'd need plus leave five for him to spend however he liked. However anything needing guard duty by somebody named 'Doc' was bound to be illegal and it could mean that they'd be protecting it from cops or worse. Still, his training was still strong in his mind and he still had most of his gear stored away in the attic, well maintained and ready for use. Assuming that things didn't get too hairy, he'd be able handle anything short of other trained soldiers.

"Tell me more and maybe I'll tell ya." He replied with a smile as he imagined the money that was looking to be more and more in his reach.

_**One Week Later, Warehouse District, Doc's Place**_

"Well, Mr. Harris, I must say that you've impressed me. Of the ten men I hired for this job, only you and two others survived," Doc stated as he finished examining the merchandise. "Also it would seem that my merchandise has arrived in excellent condition. Considering the gunfire I heard that is quite the feat indeed."

Tony had to smile with a bit of pride at those words but it was tempered by what he had fought that night. They weren't human and if it hadn't been for the others being closer he had, no doubt he'd be dead right now.

Like Franklin.

It bothered him that he'd no longer have his old friend to talk and bitch to over a mug of brew but what was done was done. Still, he felt a certain… obligation… to do one good deed in his friend's memory. He'd… he'd drop ten Gs in the mailbox of Frankie's home once he left this place. It wouldn't be much but it'd at least take some of the burden of the funeral off his wife and kid. Not that they deserved it or anything but he figured there had to be some reason his war buddy had stuck with them for so long.

"Well, here's your money, Mr. Harris. Forty thousand dollars for four night's work," Doc said as he handed over the satchel full of money. "Have a good evening!"

He was just about to leave when he had an idea that could save him both money and hassle.

"Hey Doc? You got many friends in the medical community?" he asked offhand only turning halfway towards the old man, "Are any of them in record keeping or in the maternity ward?"

"Some yes. Why do you ask?" Doc asked sounding quite confused by the questions.

"Do you think they'd be able to slip a record of birth in without anyone being the wiser? Something good enough to stand up to sharp government eyes?" he asked, wanting to know if his hunch was accurate.

"Well, it would be difficult and they'd likely want something in return," Doc replied, sounding a bit interested in the enterprise. "Perhaps if you told me a bit more I could give you a more definite answer."

This was the big jump point. If he explained everything and this guy went to the cops, he'd be locked away but, if he clammed up and said nothing, he'd have to go the more expensive route. In the end he chose to take a chance and save some money.

"You might've heard about that big accident at the gas station outside of town a little over a month ago. My wife and I were there when it happened," he explained, looking around to remain as calm as possible. "We found this baby, in the field nearby, and we sort of took him home with us. The kid was completely naked, no sign of parents anywhere, so we figured someone had to take care of him.

"We've kept an eye out for any missing baby reports in the news or at the S.P.D ever since but nothing's popped up," he continued, feeling a little more at ease since the main secrets were now out. "The thing is, though, it's only a matter of time before people notice us taking care of a kid. I was wondering if you could use your contacts to slip some files into the right places so that if anyone looks, it'll all look official."

"Would they be making it look like your wife had given birth to the baby or would you prefer adoption?" Doc asked, sounding like it might be possible for him to do it.

That would be the question. It's a tough call since he didn't know what the brat would look like down the road. If the kid didn't look a thing like his parents, people might look suspicious. Adoption would probably be the safer route.

"Adoption," he replied finally.

"A wise choice and definitely the easier to do of the two," Doc said before scratching his chin in thought. "You'll need to bring the child here so I can run the necessary tests on him. Forms need to be filled out and the closer to being accurate they are, the better they'll stand up to official scrutiny."

"So you'll do it?" he asked wanting to hear it from the man's own lips.

"For say… the return of ten thousand dollars of your payment, it'd be a done deal, Mr. Harris." Doc said with an honest smile.

_A bit expensive but still less than I'd have to pay going to the others._ He thought before extending his hand and saying, "I'd say we have a deal, Doc Tazu. I'll bring the kid around tomorrow."

Years passed in Sunnydale and, despite the shady way in which it was done, no one ever suspected that Alexander LaVelle Harris was anything other than the adopted son of Jessica and Tony Harris. For a long time there was happiness in the Harris household and even Tony was warming to the idea of being a father, although that could be because it had won him the favor of his supervisor. However, at the age of five, this all changed when, during a party involving Tony's friends and their families, Alex suddenly collapsed to the ground. He was rushed to the hospital and examined by a 'friend' of Doc Tazu rather than one of the other doctors on staff. No one knew this, of course, not even Tony, but by the end of the examination it was determined that the boy was showing signs of a rare form of anemia. So rare that only a handful of other cases had been recorded in the entire world. There was a treatment, a pill that Alexander could take anytime he started to feel the symptoms, but it would at most take the edge off of the effects of his condition. The adopted son of the Harris family would be able to do most things without difficulty but serious exertion would have a high probability of causing the symptoms to flare up.

This, of course, did not help Alex, or Xander, as he came to prefer being called since it made things easier for his friend Willow, who couldn't quite pronounce Alexander quite right. It meant that aside from some basic exercises he couldn't participate in any team sports, nor could he participate in any other activity that would have had him gasping for air by the end. Naturally this made it difficult for him to make friends outside of Willow and Jesse, since he couldn't relate to the athletes nor was he smart enough to hang out with the eggheads. The geeks… well, he liked some of the things that they did but he knew how others treated Andrea and Jonathan at school, so he didn't want to become anything that would make him even more of an outcast.

As the years passed, though, things at home began to circle the proverbial bowl as the pills that youngest resident of the Harris home needed weren't the cheapest. After all, the type of anemia he had was rare and so not a lot of resources had been devoted to the treatment so developing a cheaper, more affordable version of the pill. Thus, for years, money that Tony Harris had earned was funneled into buying the pills and, as his salary fluctuated with the times, it became harder with every passing year to make ends meet. Now most parents would be concerned, be even a little depressed, but they would never once think it wasn't worth it to help their child. Tony Harris… well, Tony had only been happy about having a son so long as it didn't inconvenience him or get in the way of what he wanted. With the drain the medicine was providing, his attitude towards his 'son' went from annoyed to frustrated to angry within the space of only three years. Before long a combination of financial distress and his long time alcoholism caused Tony to take out his anger on his family. Never a strong woman to begin with, Jessica easily lost the strength to stand up to her husband and soon fell to the siren call of hard liquor to numb the pain of her life.

Xander, however, proved to be more resilient and, with the support of his friends, he was able to keep his familiar lopsided smile and the humor that made him who he was. Even though he spent as little time at home as he could in order to avoid the abuse of his father. Even though he had to wear used clothes and hand me downs because his parents either couldn't afford anything new or because they didn't care. Even though in the entire school, the only two people who treated him nice were his friends with all the others seeing him as either a nobody or a loser.

All this time, though, a part of him wondered why his life had to be so hard. Why his parents had gone from being so nice to being so bad.

He didn't get anything even remotely resembling an answer until his second year of high school when he bumped into a blonde transfer student from Los Angeles.

It was then that he learned that he had been living on a town that sat on top of a literal mouth to hell or, rather, one of many hell dimensions. He learned that vampires, demons and everything he had been taught was fiction was in fact all too real. He had been stunned by this revelation and wondering if maybe it was the Hellmouth that was responsible for his anemia and, by extension, the downward spiral his familial relationships with his parents. However it wasn't until first blood was drawn, when Jesse, someone he considered a brother in all but blood, was killed and then turned into a vampire, that things changed forever. He tried so hard to reach the Jesse he knew inside of the walking corpse, clinging to the belief that something of his best friend remained, but in the end it was his wooden stake that turned the blood drinker to dust. It was in those moments of seeing the dust and ash fall to the ground that he committed himself to fighting the supernatural evil alongside the Slayer, Buffy Summers.

In the two years that followed he would be involved in struggles that forced him to be mindful of when he exerted himself because, each time he pushed himself, he had to take one more pill than he usually had to. Sometimes it couldn't be avoided and this caused his bottle to empty sooner than later, resulting in his father having to pay for a refill more often. Needless to say this only worsened his father's treatment of him but he didn't care. He was helping his girls and, through them, the world by taking a stand against the darkness.

However, just as they say that the night is always darkest before the dawn, so too was Xander's life about to descend into darkness.

Xander's life and one belonging to another, that is.

_**Sunnydale, California**_

_**October 6**__**th**__**, 1998**_

_**Night, The Streets of Sunnydale, Tony's P.O.V**_

_That fucker Jenkins! Thinks he can humiliate in front of everyone like that! _Tony thought with anger as he took another swig of Jack Daniels, _I'll show him! I'll show all of them!_

It had been one of the bi-monthly office parties that had started about three years and, even though he'd rather have been catching the game at home, he knew not showing up would only mean trouble for him in the end. The new number one guy at the company was a big stickler for employee solidarity and tended to examine employees who didn't attend these get togethers with a very exposing microscope. While he didn't have much to hide, there were at least two things that would get him fired without a doubt if anyone in management found out. One was his smuggling out a few files to hand over to some business rivals of the company for a significant sum of money plus some stock in that company. The other was accidental death of some street bum who'd wandered into the worksite and gotten himself killed. He'd been the one who was supposed to lock the place up afterwards but forgot due to having just a little too much beer on the job. There'd been investigations for both incidents but, as far as he knew, no one event thought he knew what happened much less was responsible for both. All it would take, though, was just the right level of scrutiny to shine the spotlight on him and then he'd be booted out of the company and into jail. So, despite his displeasure, he had made sure from day one that he and his wife attended every single one of them and looking the best they could while attending.

They'd been mostly boring up until tonight, when Fred Jenkins had started telling water cooler stories and had attracted quite a crowd as the party went on. During the closing hours of the party, Jenkins had begun to mockingly tell a story about him but it was about a screw up of his that, up until that moment, hadn't been pinned on anyone. It wasn't a mess that'd get him fired but he knew now that if he'd been under consideration for a promotion prior to the party he was now officially out of the running. The look on Fred's face after the supervisor had left to investigate matters was all the proof he needed that the bastard had planned everything from start to finish. MOTHERFUCKER! He wasn't above a little stacking of the deck when it was needed but that was going way too far. If you had something on someone at work, you threatened them with it in private. NOT in front of everyone like that! Now he had to get back home as quickly as he could and destroy everything there that could implicate him. It wasn't much but if he waited he was sure he'd be found out.

_The files I can burn easy enough,_ he thought as he took a turn a little faster than the posted speed limit. _I'll have to hide the money stashed in the trunk, though. FUCK! I'm going to kill Fred for this and in this town I can get away with it! One more corpse wouldn't raise too much of a commotion._

"Tony, m-maybe you should slow down a bit!" Jessica said from beside him, strangely not as doped up as she'd been a few moments ago.

"Shut up, bitch, and don't you tell what the fuck to do! Ya hear!" he yelled at before backhanding her in the face.

Didn't that bitch know what her role in their relationship was! He was the king, the RULER, and his word was law as far as their family was concerned. Her sole purpose was to serve and please him! She was not supposed to get uppity ideas like her opinion being worth more than shit! Dammit! Ever since she convinced him to take that brat in, Jessica had been getting all sorts of weird ideas about what she was entitled to. He'd have to teach her a lesson with his fists after he finished disposing of the evidence back home. As much as he might want to, though, he'd have to leave that face of hers alone. Not that it was much to look at these days but, if she stepped out of the house with bruises and cuts, it'd cause him no end of trouble. He'd make most of them body blows and, if that worthless 'son' of his tried to get in the way, he'd give him twice the number of hits his 'mother' got. The brat might have learned to take a beating over the years but he could still bring the pain to that back tacking ingrate when it mattered.

Just thinking of that piece of shit reminded him of how much money he was shoveling out just to get that blasted medicine the friggin' hospital prescribed. The little prick had been downing more of them than usual since he started high school and it bled his bank account dry. He barely had enough money to keep his house livable, never mind keep the fridge stocked with beer. That pissed him off because there were some days a man just wasn't supposed to face sober and he was starting to need something that gave more of a buzz in a smaller bottle. Maybe he should kill that little bastard along with Fredricks. One body… two bodies, what did it matter. This place was full of graveyards! People died here all the time with no one raising a fuss!

He was just about to begin making plans to kill off his drain of a son and the man who'd humiliated him at the party when he spotted something ahead. It took only a moment for the headlights of the car to illuminate who it was but this caused his mind to freeze up even worse than usual thanks to the booze. It looked like it was a trio of people dressed up like zombies and so without thinking he turned hard on the wheel of his car to the right to avoid them. This, however, turned out to be a bad move since the car was in such a bad state due to him skimping on visits to the garage for maintenance. As such when it hit the curb, numerous things snapped robbing the wheel of the vehicle of the ability to direct its course in any way. It could not be directed away from the house it was barreling towards and crashed through the front of the structure with all the subtlety of a runaway train. So violent was it that his head smacked up against the steering wheel, making the blackness of unconsciousness dance along the edges of his vision.

This was perhaps a mercy granted by God himself because, while both he and his wife were rendered incapable of thinking straight, the gasoline that was escaping from the crack in its tank had finally expanded to the point where the heat and sparks created by the engine could interact with it. Like the cars at the gas station so long ago, it exploded in a torrent of flame.

It didn't end there, though.

The home that they had crashed into had been undergoing repairs in the kitchen and it had been the intent of the owners to replace the old gas stove for an electric one. However they'd only gotten so far as removing the gas stove so far, which left the pipes that carried the gas still in the walls with very little to protect them from the fire unleashed from the exploding car. With bits of metal flying through the air, the pipes that once carried the gas to the stove were broken open and the residual gas was quick to ignite. It burned a path back to the tank where rest was causing it to ignite as well and all at once the house was shattered in a massive explosion. Fire and debris were strewn everywhere but most terrible of all was that the house was not empty when this happened.

The wife and husband of the smartest girl at Sunnydale High had been in the house at the time as they had returned from their latest tour of seminars.

So it came to pass that both of the parents of Xander Harris and Willow Rosenberg died in fiery destruction.

_**One Week Later, Summers Home, Xander's P.O.V**_

They're dead.

That one phrase had been popping up in his head ever since the police had shown up at his home the morning after Buffy's welcome back party. He'd returned home that night to a quiet house but simply assumed that his parents had gone straight to bed upon their return from the office party. It hadn't been until he'd been woken up at eight in the morning by a banging on the front door that he realized something might be wrong. He hadn't been told what was the matter at first, just been grabbed by Detective Stein before having some handcuffs slapped on him, but when he'd arrived at the police station he learned a somewhat twisted version of the truth.

He was being accused of sabotaging his father's car resulting in not only Tony's death but also his mother's and Willow's parents.

It had been more the fact that Willow's parents were dead than his that caused him to sit there stunned while Stein did his posturing and threatening in the hopes of getting a full confession. It hadn't been until the asshole of a Detective had knocked over his chair sending him to the ground that he'd snapped out of it. He, of course, denied everything. He might not love his parents the way that most children do but he certainly didn't hate them enough to tamper with the car to make sure they'd crash. He also would never do anything to hurt Willow's parents because while he didn't approve of how they left his best friend alone for such long stretches he knew the redhead would be devastated if they died. Add that to the fact that his Uncle Rory had only taught him the basics of cars and he doubted very much that he could have rigged the car to crash on any sort of time delay. It wasn't until Giles had stormed into the police department and told Stein off that he was finally allowed to leave. The G-Man had made it clear that unless the Sunnydale Police Department had anything other than circumstantial evidence, they had no right to hold him.

Stein didn't like that but **DAMN** if Giles couldn't be intimidating when he put his British mind to it.

It had been when they'd all gone to Buffy's place and he saw Willow for the first time since the party last night. It saddened him greatly to see such grief and sorrow on her face and he didn't hesitate for a moment to take her into his arms and comfort her. The others had the good sense to just let them sit on the couch of the Summers' home like that until Willow had gotten it all out of her system. After that…well, they did their best to just cope while the funeral preparations were being carried out. Buffy and the rest of the Scoobies did their best to help them get through it all, even Cordy, and it was nice that they all cared so much.

Now, two days after the funerals, he and Willow were left with the question of what they were going to do.

Neither he nor Willow were of age so they couldn't exactly live on their own and paying the bills was going to be a little hard, even assuming they got any money from the life insurance or whatever. He didn't pretend to know any of the particulars of the whole last will and testament thing or life insurance but he knew that choices would have to be made soon. Joyce had already volunteered to adopt the two of them in order to keep the gang together and Giles had likewise made the offer if for some reason Joyce was rejected as a possibility. He hoped that everything worked out for the two of them because if the gang got split up because of this Buffy would have only Oz and Cordy to rely on. Oz seemed to be the reliable sort but Cordy, well, he wasn't sure how long she'd stick with the team if Buffy became more reliant on her for help. His girlfriend was the sort of person who looked after her own safety first and only got involved with the rest of the human population if it was necessary. It'd be nice if she was a little more caring about others but he knew it was mostly due to her parents teaching her how someone 'of her station' should act. The Chase family was one of the richest in town and those sort of people were constantly concerned about how others perceived them.

He wondered what sort of person Cordy would be if she didn't have to worry about status or how other people chose to perceive her.

Hearing a knock at the door, he got up from the couch where he'd been watching a movie with the gang and moved to answer it. Joyce was in the kitchen so she couldn't do it and the others were getting into the chick flick so he'd do the nice thing and exit the area before it got too sappy. When he opened the door though he saw standing in front of him a forty something man in a business suit with something of a professional look on his face.

"Alexander LaVelle Harris?" the man asked sounding like he needed to get the pole out of his ass.

"Yeah. Who are you?" he asked with a bit of edge to his tone.

"Jason Blackman, California Department of Social Services," Mr. Blackman replied, showing his ID for a few seconds before putting it back into his jacket pocket. "I'm here to have a word with you and Ms. Willow Ira Rosenberg regarding your status as minors according to state law."

"Huh? I thought we were supposed to meet next week." He thought recalling when they were due to meet with the suits.

"That was the case but, due to a more thorough investigation of your respective files, it was decided that a rush would be put on both cases," Mr. Blackman explained before looking towards the living room. "If I may enter, I can explain it to both you and Ms. Rosenberg."

Stepping aside and using the non-verbal invitation, he managed to confirm that the man wasn't a vamp. Some people might have been dismissive of this worry, saying that no vampire would be out during the day, but he knew that there were ways a bloodsucker could get around that. With the right clothes or selective paths that didn't have direct sunlight as an issue, it was possible for a member of the undead to get around during the day.

The others noticed the sound of unfamiliar footsteps and had stopped the movie before orienting their attention on the entrance to the entrance to the living room. He could tell that most of them were wondering who he'd let in and why but he figured it'd be best if he just let the stiff ahead of him do the talking for now.

"Xander? Who's this?" Willow asked looking like she already had some ideas.

"This is Mr. Blackman from Social Services. He's here to see us, Wills," he said keeping his voice even. "He says something's raised a few red flags with our files."

This, of course, put eyes back on the newcomer, who took that as his cue to start explaining.

"Well, as you know, both Mr. Harris and Ms. Rosenberg are currently considered minors by law and, as such, cannot be permitted to live by themselves. Until they are legally of age they must be placed with suitable guardians," Mr. Blackman explained taking on a more relaxed stance. "We're well aware that Mrs. Summers and Mr. Giles have both petitioned to be those guardians but I'm afraid that they've been rejected."

"WHAT!" exclaimed everyone except the man from Social Services as they couldn't comprehend how the two adults could have been rejected.

"Explain." Buffy demanded in a frosty tone of voice.

"Well, in Mrs. Summers' case, it's the fact that her sole source of income is the Sunnydale Art Gallery which, at the moment, is just enough to support her and her daughter. The addition of two more people would, according to our records, put her fifteen percent in the red." Mr. Blackman explained, looking a little intimidated by the petite blonde. "We were also forced to reject Mr. Giles based on his low income as High School librarian and the fact that he has ties to a company overseas, which could lead him to take unexpected leaves of absence. Add to that the fact that he was a suspect in a murder investigation last year and it was determined that he would not be a suitable guardian."

"He was cleared of those charges!" Buffy exclaimed, looking like she would soon grab onto the guy and start shaking if he didn't wise up.

"Nevertheless, even being suspected of a crime is usually enough to make the bigwigs back at the office think twice about approving someone. Add to that the comments we received from the investigating officers were less than flattering and it pretty much put an end to any chances Mr. Giles had." Mr. Blackman said, trying to muster some control of the situation, "Besides we…um"

The way the man had just suddenly broken off made him think that the guy had just barely managed to catch himself before he said something he shouldn't. It made him believe that there was more to this than the guy was letting on and he was going to find out the truth of this mess.

"Besides what?" he asked, taking a step into the man's personal space.

Blackman seemed to consider his options for a moment, mostly between denying everything and telling them everything, before sighing in defeat.

"The truth of the matter is that as soon as we were notified of yours and Ms. Rosenberg's parents, we automatically did a background check as part of the process. We discovered that there was quite a bit of evidence of parental abuse from the Harris household and proof that the Rosenbergs barely spent any time at home in the last five years alone," Blackman said, bracing himself for the trouble he'd get into if anyone found out he'd blabbed. "As the facts piled up… well, let's just say that my supervisor wanted this cleaned up so perfectly that he could see his face in it by the end. That means you two have to be placed with a family with a spotless record and more than enough money to support you. A blood relation would be best but, if none of them take you or exist, we'd find another suitable married couple."

"So basically Social Services finally realize they dropped the ball with us and now you need a glowing report of how you cleaned it all up to make everything all better. Right?" he asked, getting more than a little ticked at how the organization was only **now** getting a clue.

"Basically, yeah. This is a real black eye for my department and since no one on the outside's caught on yet the supervisor wants everything fixed as soon as possible." Blackman replied not sounding pleased at how things were unfolding, "As it so happens we managed to find blood relations for the both of you and they both live in the same town so you won't be split up. Mr. Harris will be sent to his Aunt on his mother's side. Her name is Martha Kent, married to a Jonathan Kent, and she lives in a small town named Smallville in the state of Kansas. Ms. Rosenberg, on the other hand, will be sent to her Aunt Nell Potter. Both have glowing reviews in their background checks and possess a stable income."

The name Martha Kent rang some bells for him but only during times when Tony and his Mom experienced money troubles. Sometimes it'd go smoothly and other times Tony would be in a rip roaring fury for the rest of that week before he went down to what could be called his normal level of angry. He'd never actually seen his Aunt Martha but he could vaguely recall seeing a picture of her once when he was younger. A redhead with a kind face was the only thing he could remember. He didn't know about Willow's Aunt but the fact that they'd both be going to the same town was a godsend if there ever was one. He still didn't like the fact that he'd be forced to leave Sunnydale and the fight he'd sworn to share with Buffy but he didn't see a way around this obstacle. Well… other than making a run for it and living life on the lam until he hit eighteen but he didn't think he'd like that. In the end he decided that he'd go along with it all. After all, he'd be eighteen soon enough and once that was done he could come right back to Sunnydale without a problem. He was sure that G-Man or Joyce would provide a place for him to stay until he could find a place of his own and afford to pay the rent on it.

"And there's no way we can convince your boss to let us stay here with Mr. Giles or Mrs. Summers?" he asked, just to make sure there was no way to avoid what seemed to be inevitable.

"Not unless you're friends with someone above him and have a favor to call in." Mr. Blackman replied with a shake of his head.

"How soon do we have to go?" he asked, hoping he'd have enough time to prepare.

"By the end of the week, if at all possible. We'd like to try and get you both enrolled in Smallville High School before the end of October." Jason replied, sounding more relaxed now that the receivers of his information seemed to have accepted their fate.

It only made sense, of course.

It was useless to shoot the messenger once the message has been delivered.

Besides, a change of scenery would do Willow some good and help her get over her grief.

With a little help with the Xan-Man, of course.

_**The Sunnydale Bus Depot, Morning, One Week Later, Willow's P.O.V**_

"So, I guess this is goodbye." Willow said as both she and Xander watched the bus station employee began loading the luggage.

"Just for a little while. You guys can come back on holidays and everything," Buffy said, looking like she believed her friends were just leaving for the weekend. "Plus, once you're old enough, you can go wherever you like. You'll be all of age and everything."

"Yeah, and we can send each other emails and letters as often as we like," she said, doing her best to keep this from being a tear filled parting of friends, "I expect at least one email a week, missy!"

"Sure," Buffy said before turning to Xander. "Keep in touch, Xander, and look after Willow okay?"

"'Til my dying breath, Buff. Count on it," Xander promised before wrapping an arm around the redhead's shoulders.

As the rest of the gang said their goodbyes she had to wonder what it would really mean for them going their separate ways and all. Oz had obligations with the band and finishing his last year of school at Sunnydale High, so he couldn't exactly drive all the way out to Smallville, Kansas. That wouldn't stop them, though! He'd promised he'd get a computer with a web-cam and everything so that they could chat whenever they could schedule the time and they'd get together during the holidays. It would be just like Xander said: they'd humor the adults and wait until they hit eighteen and then move back to Sunnydale. Until then she'd do her best to stay satisfied with just emails, letters, chats and the occasional holiday get together. For Xander and Cordy, it'd be a little harder since he didn't have a computer of his own and Cordy wasn't very computer savvy. Point the rich girl at clothes and she could probably put most fashion designers to shame but a computer might as well have been a sci-fi- nerd's box of geek facts. She'd have been lucky to know where to start, never mind actually getting a chat up and running. Maybe if she asked one of her maids or butlers to help her out with it but otherwise not a chance.

"Attention all passengers of bus ten: the bus will depart in five minutes." Came the announcement over the P.A system, "I repeat: the bus will depart in five minutes."

"Well, you had best be going. You would not want to miss your bus," Giles said before taking off his glasses and vigorously cleaning them. "Do try to behave for your temporary guardians. They'll no doubt find you both as vexing as I do at times but they your relatives and will no doubt treat you well."

She had to smile at Giles' discomfort as the British man obviously wasn't used to mushy goodbyes or stuff like that. Still, it was nice to know that he cared about her and Xander like this and she'd make sure to call his number after calling the others to see how he was doing. He'd been a surrogate father figure to both her and Xander since their birth parents were always either absent or not worthy of the title parents. While she had always been academically inclined, the introduction to the paranormal and all the research that followed had truly broadened her horizons. She still had all the websites that Ms. Calendar had pointed out to her, plus a few copies of some of the more common demonology textbooks. The websites were easy enough to conceal on her laptop but the books would have to wait until she arrived in Smallville so she could secret them away in her room. Giles hadn't heard of any demonic or supernatural threats in the Smallville area aside from some legends from the local Indian tribe but she felt it'd be better to be safe than sorry.

"See you next holiday, Buff'." Xander said, hugging the blonde in a sign of true friendship.

Deciding to get in on it, she officially made it a group hug and appreciated it when Giles at least put an arm into the mix. With all the right words spoken and actions taken she picked up the single carry-on bag that she'd be taking to her seat while Xander picked up his backpack which she knew was filled with all the essentials for him: comics, Coca-Cola and, of course, four packages of Twinkies.

_I hope not too many people have to use the bathroom along the way._ She thought since she didn't like the image of Xander dancing in front of the door to the bus' toilet.

_**The Bus, The Next Day, Leaving the Last Stop Before Smallville, Afternoon, Xander's P.O.V**_

"They should just round up all them muties and shoot'em!" said an overweight businessman sitting on the other side of the bus, "They're freaks and that's all we need to know about'em."

_God? I know we aren't exactly best buddies but __**please**__ have this guy stay on the bus when it leaves Smallville. _Xander thought as he tried not to let the idiot's ranting ruin his mood, _'Cause if that guy's going to be my neighbor or school principal, I am so going to consider making a run for it._

The bigot hadn't been on the bus from the beginning but, even after dealing with the guy for the last four hours, he was about ready to spend the rest of the trip in the bathroom the bus had at the back. It had been 'muties this' and 'freaks that' when it came to this guy. He was no stranger to the whole mutant issue just because he was in Sunnydale but it'd never really mattered to him. Even before he learned about vampires and demons, he hadn't really given the whole mutant issue much thought other than to keep an eye out for one of them causing trouble. He guessed it was a part of the whole Sunnydale Denial Syndrome that he'd ignored the strange along with the bizarre. After he'd been enlightened about the supernatural, he'd put blood sucking vamps and world ending demons at the top of his list of worries. After all he lived on a Hellmouth, where it was far more likely for him to run into one of those than a mutant. He'd seen the odd news story on TV but in his opinion the newshounds were blowing things completely out of proportion. Sure, mutants had some pretty weird powers and stuff, but they were still human where it counted. From what he'd heard they were just like anyone else until their abilities clicked on and, if Buffy was any hint, powers didn't change who a person was all that much. Sure, she wasn't the blonde version of Cordy back in her old high school any more but she hadn't gone all psycho like a lot of the bigots claimed mutants did when they got their powers. He pushed such thoughts to the side since he figured if he was thinking this hard about the mutant issue, he was letting the racist across the aisle from him have too much influence.

Looking the other way he could see Willow was still asleep but that wasn't unexpected considering his best bud had been up most of last night reading up on Smallville. It was just like the redhead to treat something as life affecting as moving to another town like some sort of school project. Still, he supposed that they all had different ways of dealing with change. For him it was pretty much ignoring it until kicked him in the ass but for Willow, it was using her academic aptitude to her advantage and drowning herself in facts. He guessed that keeping her mind too busy to really appreciate what was going on was something Willow did often. He often suspected that that was part of the reason why his childhood friend was so perky and energetic when it came to the Scooby research sessions. Some of the things they had dealt with were pretty damn scary and often knocked them on their butts with how it changed their view of the world. He coped with it all with his prime sense of humor but Willow treated it as just another subject to excel in learning about.

_That's my Wills for ya!_ He thought with a smile. _Never met a book she didn't want to read cover to cover._

Not wanting to disturb her, he began to root around in his backpack to try and find a comic to help pass the time. He'd read through most of them but he was pretty sure there was at least one issue he hadn't touched yet. It took a minute but he finally managed to find what he sought and pulled it out in one go. What he got though was something that made all thoughts of reading shimmer away as he found that he'd also taken out a picture of him and Cordy without meaning to. Seeing her face brought back the last moment he'd seen her and, quite frankly, he did not dwell on it too much. It hadn't been the easiest for him but at the same time he knew it had to be done.

He'd broken up with Cordy.

It has taken most of the week for him to consider it and then to actually go through with it but he'd done it. It'd been something he'd had to think about ever since it'd been pretty much set in stone that he wouldn't be able to stay in Sunnydale. He fully planned on coming back just as soon as he hit eighteen but that would still be at least a year and he hadn't been sure if his sorta girlfriend would be able to wait that long. Much like him, she was someone who craved interaction, especially with people she had feelings for. In the end he'd had to ask himself a simple question: did he believe their relationship could last on just holiday fun and the odd phone call?

No, he didn't.

He knew that her followers, the Cordettes, would get on her case about the low-class boyfriend she never saw anymore and how it was fate that their relationship was failing. Without him to reassure her and give her reasons in person to ignore the comments of her 'friends', it'd only be a question of when she'd finally given in. So instead of seeing what they had die off over the course of months, he decided the best course of action would be to just make a clean break of it.

To say she hadn't taken it well would have been an understatement.

It has pretty much killed his usually good mood until the time had come to head for the bus station and it'd taken every bit of strength he had to put on a cheerful face for the gang. He knew that Willow had seen through it but at least she hadn't called him on it yet. She probably figured that they'd have enough on their plates with moving to Smallville that'd it'd be better to wait until they finished settling in a bit. As for the others, if they suspected anything they hadn't said anything during the whole farewell thing, so he suspected that they'd just brushed off his mood as just being related to his departure. Maybe Cordy would clue them in with all the subtlety Queen C was capable of but he'd deal with that if or when it happened.

_Right now I'd better get ready to see what my Aunt Martha and Uncle Jonathan are like._ He thought as he spotted the sign saying they were twenty miles from Smallville. _At least since it's my mother's side of the family they shouldn't be hopeless drunks or bullies. Probably just a little oblivious to things they don't want to see._

_**The Road Leading to the Bus Depot, Kent Truck, Ten Minutes Later, Martha Kent's P.O.V**_

"I wonder what Alexander is like." Martha said out loud even though her eyes never left the bus depot coming up in the distance.

It was a question she asked more than once since being contacted by California Social Services about the death of her sister and brother in law almost two weeks ago. On the one hand she hadn't seen her sister in almost eighteen years, so her memories of the times they'd had together weren't the freshest. What she could remember, though, was an energetic young woman who almost always had a smile on her face or a joke on her lips to lighten the mood. She'd only gotten phone calls from her sister after she got married to Tony Harris but those two had seemed good, especially once they adopted a baby boy. She'd never heard her sister so happy as she'd been after taking Alexander into her home and that was something of an achievement. The calls had dropped off and then vanished about eleven years ago for some reason but she and Jonathan had kept sending the usual Christmas and Birthday cards nevertheless. They didn't receive anything in return but she just assumed that they'd been on a tight budget with raising their adopted son. As the years passed she just thought about her sister less and less until she'd become nothing more than a memory or a photo in an album.

Now all that was left of her sister was her only son and she was determined to do her best to take care of the young man that had brought her sister such joy.

"Hard to say, Martha. We haven't heard anything from your sister since he was six but, assuming he hasn't changed much since then, he sounds like a good kid." Jonathan said from his place behind the steering wheel of their pickup truck.

"He's almost an adult now, Jonathan. I think he's changed quite a bit from a six year old who got sick eating too many Twinkies." She pointed out believing that over ten years of growth could change a person.

Taking out the only picture that they'd been given since accepting guardianship of her nephew, she looked it over again just to make sure that she'd be able to spot him the moment he stepped off of the bus from Sunnydale. Dark black hair, brown eyes, a face that looked like it had a smile on it more often than not and a body that looked like fairly fit, even though the clothes were too baggy to be sure of that. It looked like the photo had come from last year's year book since Alexander didn't seem to know he was being photographed. On the surface he looked like your average teenage boy who, if she was a betting woman, had probably inherited his adopted mother's sense of humor somehow. All in all she was looking forward to meeting the newest resident of the Kent Farm.

A few minutes later they pulled into the bus station and, as luck would have it, the very bus carrying Alexander was entering the parking lot as well. She smiled at the good omen this would be since everything seemed to be going so smoothly. Getting out of the truck, it didn't take them long to reach the area of the building where all the passengers were coming in from but it didn't look like Alexander had disembarked just yet. Waiting a bit, she looked about the interior of the building and was a little surprised to see Nell Potter waiting as well. The flower shop owner had never exactly been her most favorite person due to how often she tried to tempt Jonathan but, for the sake of the Langs, she'd done her best to get along with the woman. Laura and her family had been good friends for a long time and she wasn't going to let one relative ruin all of that.

That didn't mean she had to interact with the woman any more than necessary, though.

"Martha," Jonathan said while giving her a light tap on the shoulder.

Looking at her husband she watched him point to the door where all of the passengers from the bus were entering the building. Turning her head in that direction, she saw the reason her husband had gotten her attention because, walking into the building next to a pretty redhead, was Alexander. While she was sure that the bus had to have made at least two stops along the way to let the passengers get something to eat, the young man definitely looked like he could use a shower and a warm meal… both of which could be provided back at the farm.

"Alexander! Over here!" she said slightly loudly in order to get the teenager's attention.

It took him seconds to find her and smiled in recognition. This was a bit surprising considering that it had been over a decade since she'd seen him last but at the same time heartening since it meant that she'd made an impression. She was a bit surprised though when the redhead followed him over in their direction, she hadn't heard anything about him bringing anyone with her, but the answer she got wasn't what she expected.

"Willow!" Nell yelled out over the noise of the incoming passengers and the people.

The redhead instantly turned in Ms. Potter's direction, making it clear that the young woman who was walking behind Alex was the one that Nell had been waiting for. Considering how close the redhead had been walking to Alex and how the young man was now turning in perfect synch with the girl, she got the distinct impression that the two had known each other longer than a single bus ride. She'd even go as far as to say that they'd been friends for years with the way they were acting right now and that meant that she'd probably be bumping into Nell quite often from now on.

Not something she was looking forward to. She'd never let it show on the surface, though.

Seeing Nell walk over, it didn't take the brunette long to draw the same conclusion and that made her put on that face that the woman always had whenever they interacted.

"Martha! Looks like we're here for the same reason." Nell said, sounding all polite and friendly.

"Looks like," she replied keeping things short and to the point.

By this time both of the newly arrived teenagers had gotten to where they were and the awkward silence manifested itself. It was the sort of silence that she recalled the few times she'd spoken to her father about Jessica, although that was mostly because her dad didn't approve of Tony Harris as a son-in-law. She decided to break the silence quickly and try to build some positive momentum for the day.

"Did you have a good trip, Alexander?" she asked the tall young man in front of her.

"Well, it wasn't too bad but there was this loud moron across the aisle from me going on and on about mutants." Alexander replied, sounding like he was glad to be away from the man, "I had to plug my ears after a while."

"Well that's over with now. You probably won't have listen to him ever again, Alex." Martha said before glancing at the redhead, "Who's your friend?"

"This is Willow, my best bud since preschool, and all around brainiac." Alex replied with a smile as he wrapped an arm around his shorter friend before looking at Nell, "I take it you're her Aunt Nell?"

"That I am. Pleased to meet you, Alexander." Nell said extending a hand out of politeness.

"Call me Xander. Willow does." Xander said, his face not losing its smile as he shook her hand, "Back when we were in preschool she had such a tough time saying Alexander that she shortened to Xander. Been that ever since."

She had to smile at that and was ever more certain that the two teenagers in front of her had a strong friendship years in the making. With this in mind she promised herself she wouldn't do anything to hurt their friendship, even if it meant being enduring some of Nell's more annoying habits. She just hoped that Nell would likewise mind herself and not do anything to make things harder for the two young people.

"Sounds like you too have quite a history with each other." Nell said as she withdrew her hand from the shaking, "I look forward to hearing all about it."

Nell was interested.

Not good.

"Yes, well, I'm sure both of you would like to get settled and maybe get a bite to eat," she said before looking Xander in the eye. "Shall we go Xander?"

"Uh…sure. Call you later, Wills!" Xander replied as he turned towards the exit.

"Sure!" Willow said with a smile.

_I think things are going to work out just fine with these two. _She thought each of them went in their desired direction.


	2. Changes they are a comin'

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the copyrighted material contained herein. They belong to their creators and associated companies. I make no profit off of this whatsoever. I write because there are those that enjoy my work and because I find it fun to write fanfic. Therefore I would appreciate it if the creators and companies refrained from filing any lawsuits against me. I can assure them that whatever you get from me won't even cover one tenth of the lawyer fees.

_**Two Days Later, Kent Farm, Morning, Xander's POV**_

_I think I'm actually getting better for a change._ Xander thought as he worked at cooking breakfast for his Aunt and Uncle.

It was something he'd become determined to do for them every chance he got to pay them back for taking him in. He'd been a bit intimidated by the sight of the farm when they'd first pulled up to it and had been even more shocked to know that it used to be even bigger before they'd come on hard financial times. They'd avoided the topic but he could tell that it was taking every penny they had just to keep what they had at the moment. He hated the fact that he'd wind up being even more of a financial drain on them and, while he couldn't do any farm work thanks to his anemia, he could at least do some of the chores inside the house. He couldn't push himself too far and was still feeling out which chores he'd have to leave alone, but he was confident that by the end of the week he'd have a solid list made up.

_One of the benefits of having neglectful parents I guess._ He thought as he took some pride in the fine breakfast he was managing to put together. _The bacon looks just about ready._

Scooping the last piece of the breakfast he'd made for his Aunt and Uncle before putting an equal amount on each plate, he wasn't surprised at all to hear someone coming down the stairs. He knew the few times he'd stayed at Willow's house that the smell of a delicious breakfast was usually enough to rouse him out of bed before noon on weekends. Looking towards the stairs, he was surprised to see that it was Jonathan rather than his Aunt Martha like he'd thought it'd be. The man was still half asleep from the looks of his face but the smell of good feed was waking him up bit by bit. Showing the older man a welcoming grin, he picked up the pot of coffee and poured the man a cup before passing it to the man of the house.

"Thanks." Jonathan said taking a good sip before resuming, "You know you don't have to do all of this every morning."

"Yes, I do. I know you haven't stated it right out but I can see the signs of pennies being pinched and dollars being stretched," he said, taking on a more serious tone of voice. "Mom and Tony did it often enough. I might not be able to help you deal with the cows or pick corn but I can at least do this when I can."

"Okay, but don't push yourself too hard," the Kent man said as he sat down at the kitchen table. "I might not be a doctor but I know that working too hard can't be good for someone with anemia."

"Believe me I know. Still, as long as I keep taking my prescription, I'll be fine." he said, reflexively patting his pocket to make sure the pill bottle was close by.

"Speaking of which, we'll probably need to visit the hospital to set it up so you can keep getting it." Jonathan said before taking another sip of coffee.

"Don't worry about that. I got three big bottles of the stuff before we left Sunnydale." he said, trying to make sure that his Uncle knew that they didn't have to resupply anytime soon.

It was one of the things he hoped he'd have some time to work on. He knew enough from Tony that the medicine didn't come cheaply and, considering the Kents seemed to be in dire financial straits just holding onto their farm, he didn't even want to think about how nasty things would get when the supply he'd brought with him ran out. Either they'd have to find a cheaper substitute or he'd have to find a job and work as many hours as he has to in order to contribute as much as he could to the cost. He doubted that he'd be able to manage anything other than part time if he wanted to keep his grades where they needed to be in order for him to graduate at the end of the year. Still, he owed it to them for taking him in instead of sending him down the line of relatives to eventually wind up in the foster care system. He'd do whatever he could to help them out without draining his pill supply any faster than he had to.

They continued talking for a while about a variety of subjects and eventually Aunt Martha came downstairs as well, asking about the delicious aroma. By the time that 8am rolled around they all had smiles on their faces and bellies full of delicious food.

He should have known something would happen to sour things for him.

It started out simply enough with the phone on the wall ringing and Uncle Jonathan getting up to answer it. He didn't think anything of it since he hadn't become accustomed enough to how things worked on a farm to know whether it was out of the ordinary or not. However, when he heard the name 'Principal Kwan', he knew that something was up and that it involved him. He only paid half attention to what was being said but he heard enough to know it was about his school records. As far as he knew, everything was on the up and up as far as his marks were concerned so he figured it probably had to do with the detentions he'd been slapped with by Snyder. Knowing the troll, there were probably some pretty nasty stuff written about him in the records but he was sure if he let the Kents know what sort of person he was and what sort of person Snyder was they'd let the bad stuff slide right off of them.

"Alright. We'll be there in an hour, Jim." Jonathan said with a half-serious look on his face.

_The Principal is calling us in? _he thought with a frown as he scarfed down the last piece of toast. _Somehow I don't think this can be of the good._

"Xander, I want you to take a shower and get dressed." his Uncle Jonathan said as he stood there looking at his ward. "It seems your new Principal has some questions he'd like to ask you about your grades."

Definitely not of the good.

_**Outside of Principal Kwan's Office, Smallville High School, An Hour Later, Willow's P.O.V**_

To say that Willow's mind was going a mile a minute wouldn't be entirely accurate.

It was actually going one light year per minute and was just getting warmed up.

Ever since her Aunt Nell got the phone call from the school principal, she had been tip toeing all the way to the meeting while trying to figure out what the problem could be. She mentally reviewed every test and assignment she'd been given since first grade to see if there's anything she'd missed but nothing sent up any red flags. Ever since she'd first attended school, she taken the whole education thing seriously and done her best to get top marks in all her classes. True, this was partly, okay majorly, due to her parents putting such high expectations on her shoulders but she'd been able to find a silver lining soon enough that she didn't mind it too much. In any case, she was clueless about what the problem could be and that had her getting increasingly worked up. Right now she and her Aunt were just waiting for the other members of the meeting to arrive but, knowing Xander, they'd be at least fifteen minutes late. Her best friend was only punctual when she made sure to go over to his place and wake him up early enough that both of them would have no trouble being where they needed to be on time.

That was why she was a bit surprised to see him stroll in five minutes later with his Aunt and Uncle.

"Xander… you're on time!" she exclaimed before she could get over her shock enough to say something a little more intelligent.

"Yep! Though I think this is going to be one of the few times I'm going to regret being on time." Xander said, glancing in the direction of the door that led to Principal Kwan's office.

She couldn't disagree with him on that.

With all concerned parties present, the secretary notified Principal Kwan, who was attending to business elsewhere in the school. She thought it was pretty inconsiderate of the man to call them in for what looked to be an important meeting only to not be there when they arrived. It took the Asian man a few minutes but he eventually showed up and escorted the five of them into his office, closing the door. It was only after everyone took a seat that the man looked ready to explain what the purpose of this morning meeting was.

"I'm sorry for calling you all in like this but something has been brought to my attention by the principal of Sunnydale High School that has forced me to reconsider some things." Kwan said as he took two file folders off of a stack of them, "According to him and their computer tech there are signs that the school's mainframe was hacked about four years ago and a back door installed. They haven't been able to determine for certain who put it there but so far the only files that have been tampered with so far belong to Mr. Harris and Ms. Rosenberg. It is Principal Snyder's opinion that the purpose of this back door was to alter grades and since you two are the only ones with files altered that you two are involved somehow."

"WHAT!?" was the reaction from both her and Xander while their guardians had the whole silent shock thing going on.

"I don't want to believe it but the evidence, combined with Principal Snyder's comments in both of your files, is not something I can just sweep under the carpet," James stated with a sympathetic tone of voice. "Therefore I have a proposition for you. Normally the penalty for this would be expulsion but instead you will both simply be made to start over from your freshmen year. You'll go through all four years before graduating. During this time you'll both be under close scrutiny by your teachers for any signs of cheating or tampering with your grades."

This couldn't be happening!

She worked hard the last three years, especially with splitting her time between school and Scooby work, and to have it all wiped away as though it didn't exist hurt. While she couldn't dispute the fact that she did do some hacking on occasion but it was always in the service of helping the gang fight the latest big bad. She'd never once hacked into the school computers for the purpose of changing her grades or Xander's. How could this have happened?

Looking over at Xander, she could see that he was shocked as well but there was something in his eyes that made her hope that this meeting ended soon. She could count on one hand the number of times he'd been like this and every time he blew up within twenty minutes angrily ranting at whatever or whoever had pissed him off. If he did it outside someplace then it'd be okay but if he did it in front of the Principal of Smallville High School, then he'd only make things worse for them.

"That is not to say that you won't be able to expedite matters," Principal Kwan stated, as if sensing the emotional content of the situation. "At the end of this year you'll have the opportunity to undergo a series of tests and hand in three assignments. They will be on material to be covered in the following year. If you can pass all of the tests and the assignments, you can skip a year and be one step closer to graduating. You'd be able to graduate in two years rather than going through all four. Are you agreeable to this?"

'_Are you agreeable to this' he says._ Thought Willow, whose mood was a little brighter now that there was a chance to speed her way to graduation. _It's not like we have a choice really._

"Yeah," she replied, not saying anything more on the subject because there was nothing else **to** say.

Xander sharply nodded his head, showing that he'd agree to it as well.

"Then starting Monday you'll be joining the rest of the freshmen. I hope that you enjoy your time here at Smallville High School." Kwan said, nonverbally dismissing them and letting them know that they could leave.

Politely they said goodbye and walked back to the parking lot where the Kent's pickup truck and Nell's car were waiting.

That was when Xander finally popped.

"That sonuvaBITCH! It's not enough that he made our lives hell back home, he's gotta ruin it for us here too!" Xander exclaimed, making angry gestures every once and a while. "BASTARD!"

"Now Xander, I don't believe you or Willow did anything but if they have evidence then they have to act on it." Mr. Kent said, trying to calm the younger man down.

"We didn't do ANYTHING but that's never been the point with Snyder." Xander snarled angrily, not calming in the least. "For him all he needs to slam us over the head with his authority is to be in a bad mood!"

With that he kicked an empty pop bottle that'd been lying nearby clear to the other side of the parking lot.

Seeing the looks that the adults were giving her best friend she decided to throw in her two cents on the matter but in a more rational way. "I know you guys probably think this is just another teen badmouthing his principal but you don't know Snyder like we do," she said, doing her best to be peacemaker. "He's more like a prison warden or drill sergeant with the way he behaves. Mr. Giles, our librarian, once said that Snyder told him that as far as he's concerned, every student is just a slacker or criminal in the making. So it's not entirely out of the question that he might do this out of sheer meanness."

"But why would he do something like this?" Mrs. Kent asked, sounding like she was willing to look at things with an open mind. "I can sort of understand someone being mean to the point of giving you detention whenever he could but why would he do something like this."

"Simple. The only students he talks about with something approaching approval are the ones that make him look good," Xander said, sounding a little more rational now. "That means the star athletes and big brains. The asshole probably did this because it was my folks in the car that started all this. This is his way of getting one last parting shot at me for taking away one of his top students and is just getting Willow involved to make me feel even worse!"

While she'd like to say that Snyder wasn't the sort to go that far just to get some hits in on them, upon thinking about it she knew it was all too much like the little mini-Hitler. It really made her wonder how a man with such a bad personality could be made principal of a high school. Weren't schools supposed to be a place where young people were encouraged to learn and grow into the adults they would eventually become? Somehow she thought that being a jerk all the time and making peoples' lives difficult would actually make students less enthusiastic about attending classes or even stepping foot on Sunnydale High School property.

Definitely counter-productive to the mission statement of academia everywhere.

The adults weren't sure what to make of that and just stood there not saying anything in favor or against what had been said.

_**Monday, Mid-Morning, The Front Steps of Smallville High School, Xander's P.O.V**_

"Well, that was an uncomfortable first class." Xander said as they proceeded down to where their last class before lunch. "You get the feeling that everyone knows why we're in the same class?"

"You're just being paranoid. There's no way that Kwan would let the truth come out and he only would have told teachers." Willow replied, brushing off the idea as impossible.

"So one of the teachers has loose lips. All I'm saying is that we stood out enough just being a good two years older than our classmates," he said, looking around and seeing more of the same stares. "We don't need to get into a mess where everyone thinks we're hackers who change our grades to get by."

He wasn't having too much trouble so far since most high schools across the country followed the same path when it came to what they taught from grade to grade. So he pretty much knew what the teachers would be teaching this year and could remember most of the major points without any difficulty, so it'd just be the smaller details he'd need to re-read. He figured it'd mean he'd have a lot more free time than most students and he could put that towards the part time job he'd be using to contribute to the cost of his medicine. He was still pissed off at Snyder for knocking them back a couple of years but at least this was a side-benefit that would work in his favor.

"That won't happen. We're just something to look at right now." Willow stated before looking around to make sure they were headed in the right direction. "Give it a week and they won't give us a second thought."

"True," he agreed as they turned the corner to the staircase that'd take them to their next class.

"Ahhhh!" a female voice cried before something slammed into him from an elevated position in front of him.

The impact on the floor wasn't so bad but what had him stunned for a moment was the fact that the person who'd fallen on top of him was both female and had the most alluring hazel eyes he'd seen in his life. He would have thought more on it but then he realized that he was on the floor, in a school, during the day with a female on top of him in what could be considered an intimate position.

"S-sorry! Are you alright?" he asked her as he gently rolled her off his body before helping her to her feet.

"Yeah… I just tripped," the blonde girl said sounding a little awkward at what had happened moments before. "Guess I was lucky that you were there to give me a soft landing. My name's Chloe Sullivan. And you are?"

"Xander Harris, transfer student and substitute mattress, at your service!" he replied with a mock salute that succeeded in bringing a smile to her face.

"I've heard about you. You're pretty big news right now." Chloe said, letting some of the smile fade.

"Really? We've only been here for less than a week." He said a bit surprised that a pair of transfer students was causing such a big stir.

"Well, Smallville really lives up to its name sometimes. It's such a small town that everyone knows everyone else and that means that anyone new moving in catches everyone's attention." Chloe replied, her smile going back up a bit. "Then there's the fact that you're both older than anyone else in your class and that sort of thing catches everyone's attention."

"Yeah, it probably would," he nodded acknowledging that fact since it'd been sort of the same back when Buffy had first come to Sunnydale High School.

"I've also heard a rumor that says you guys got knocked back to freshmen because of some illegal hacking. Any comment?" Chloe asked, taking on a more investigative look.

"No comment 'til I clear it with my lawyer." He replied in a joking manner but with a hidden message of 'do not push further' resting between the lines.

"Well then have your people talk to my people. See ya!" Chloe said before walking away down the hallway.

_What is it with me and bumping into blondes?_ He thought as he remembered how he first met Buffy. _At least I didn't say something stupid this time._

"Oh no! Xander!" Willow exclaimed, causing him to turn to her instantly.

"What? What is it?" he asked, unaware that he'd tensed up for a moment just in case it was trouble.

"We're going to be late for class!" she replied before grabbing onto his arm, "C'mon!"

With that she pulled him up the stairs almost too fast for him to find a safe place to put each foot as he jogged to keep up with his redheaded friend.

He had a feeling that this town wasn't going to be the sleepy one he thought it'd be when he'd first heard the name Smallville. He just hoped that it wouldn't be like Sunnydale or else he might wind up hopping on the bus for someplace safer. He'd had his fill of weird and potentially deadly things for the time being.

_**Luthor Corp Tower, Office of Lionel Luthor, That Very Same Evening, Lionel's P.O.V**_

"I don't think you understand the situation, General Langston," Lionel said as he poured a small glass of scotch for himself. "More and more of these… mutants are showing up every day with powers bordering on demigod. Do you really think that Trask's machines will be match for them?"

"Dr. Trask's demonstration was quite impressive, Mr. Luthor," replied General Harold Langston, refusing to let the millionaire affect him. "He showed me a prototype for one of his 'Sentinel' robots and even test fired one of its primary weapons. Punched a hole clean through a blast door we use for government bunkers like it was tissue paper. Based on that and what I've read, it looks like he'll have working field models ready for deployment within five years, if not sooner."

_He could have them deployed in three if he wasn't so insistent on perfection,_ he thought as he took a sip of his drink. _One of the reasons I fired the man. The public doesn't want 'eventually' when 'right now' will suffice for the time being._

While he wasn't above making some 'slightly flawed' merchandise, he didn't make it blatantly so since that could lead to uncomfortable court proceedings. Still, allowing one or two imperfections through was actually good for business since it meant you could re-release the same product a year or two later with the flaws removed and make quite a nice sum of money.

As for Trask, he'd seen the man's initial design for his 'Sentinel' robot but found the machine to be too limited in what it could do. The A.I program that ran the thing was terribly slow and not terribly adaptive to sudden changes in the battle variables. Perhaps one day it'd evolve enough to be a match for human beings but he wasn't prepared to let such a project drain his company's resources for that long. Apparently the military was prepared to divert resources to such a project, even if he had a far more immediate solution at the ready. True, they had yet to reach the level of human testing, but the preliminary results on various apes and monkeys had proved to be quite intriguing, if a bit… unstable. Still there were ways to expedite the process if need be and it was a far more immediate solution to the rising issue of mutants in society.

"While that does sound impressive, General, do you really think the American public will think so when hundreds of people have been killed, hurt or rendered homeless by various mutant troublemakers? People who will find out you ignored a more immediate solution for a sci-fi fanatic's childhood dream?" he said, doing his best to point out the potential drawbacks of siding with Trask. "My company has a way to level the playing field against these mutants that could be ready in a matter of months, a year at the most, and all I require is a favor from you and your associates."

"I'm quite aware of your little pet project. Something called 'Level Three', I believe." General Langston said sternly at the belittling of his choice, "I also know that the results so far are grossly inadequate to what my superiors are looking for in an anti-mutant task force. Something about a few 'unexpected retirements', I believe."

Impressive. Impressive and troublesome, even though he refused to let these opinions show on the surface.

Apparently he had a informant in his employ who was feeding information to the General. However, based on the name that the General had used and the fact that the names of those scientists who'd 'retired' early hadn't been mentioned, the leak couldn't be too important. Probably not even a part of the project itself but rather someone close enough to observe the comings and goings of the project. He'd have to put out a little bait to catch the spy and remove them. Still, it didn't matter that the General knew this much. Level Three was not the name of the project but rather its location. Still, it might be prudent to move it someplace else for the time being just in case the General decided to get more aggressive with his inquiries.

"Just a few employees I had the misfortune of overestimating. Still, Luthor Corp prides itself on providing its employees with a generous severance package," he opined, making it sound that the 'retired' people were merely let go. "As for the results of the project, the mishaps only occurred during the initial stages of the research. The latest report from the head of research says that they've gone as far as they can without moving onto the human trials. That's where you and your associates come in."

"So basically you want me to pull some strings to get the watch dogs to look the other way for a couple of months?" General Langston asked in what probably was supposed to be a sly and underneath the table way.

"Six, to be precise. Do this and your support will be duly noted when negotiations between Luthor Corp and the American government begin." he said, not saying specifically how this would benefit the General.

It was always wise to leave such things to the imagination of the other party since it provided him a way to keep the benefits to himself while throwing only crumbs to everyone else. Ah, the benefits of a verbal agreement over a written one! Add to that the fact that he'd activated special odds and ends throughout his office to prevent the meeting from being secretly recorded by anyone but him and the deck was definitely stacked in his favor.

"I'd be lying if I said you didn't make a tempting offer, Mr. Luthor. However to do what you're asking will take quite a bit of pull to pull those people away from the stink you're 'special tests' will likely give off." General Langston said with a twinkle of ambition in his eyes. "Might need some greenback incentive to get them to see things our way."

_A decent attempt, General, but you're about a century too young to play this sort of game with me._ He thought as he recognized an attempt a sly negotiation when he saw one.

"Show me that you can hold up your end of the bargain and I might be willing to forward you the necessary funds to 'persuade' the people that need such persuasion," he said, making it clear he was bringing the meeting to an end. "Now if you'll excuse me, General, I'm a busy man. Good day."

This seemed to catch the man off guard but that was a good thing since it would keep the aged soldier from formulating a counter move. With a light shove and the closing of the office door, he was alone with his thoughts to plan a way to ensure that the future went the way he wanted it to go. It was obvious that the General was still weighing the pros and cons of both his project and Trask's Sentinel program. What was needed was a way to force the general to make a choice sooner rather than later, thus making his project the more favorable option, if only for the immediacy of its availability. He could sabotage Trask's program, make it so that it'd be a decade before it recovered, but that could lead to one too many liabilities in the form of agents that could lead back to him. He needed something high profile but with as little to tie matters to him as possible. It was as he was absently looking through the list of appointments he had today that he came upon one that both annoyed him and yet provided him with the inspiration he needed.

_Perhaps what I need is a high profile event to drive home to the dear General that he doesn't have five years to wait for Trask to produce something. _He thought before reaching over to activate the intercom.

"Dominic? Bring me our black file please."

_Yes. A short phone call and a promise to wire his fee to the appropriate account upon successful completion of the task. _He thought with the idea continuing to form favorably in his mind. _Of course with only a phone call and a promise to use to trace back to him it will be near impossible to incriminate me._

The only question that remained was to come up with a target that would strike the biggest cord with the public and through them the General.

A smile appeared on his face when once again the thoughts he had of his son Lex led him to the answer he needed.

_**Entering Smallville County, Five Days Later, Morning**_

_If the money wasn't this good, I'd have said no._ thought Silas King as he drove his car closer to the sleepy town of Smallville, Kansas. _Guess I'm going to have to make the most of this side job._

He'd been in the middle of his own little heroin job in Nevada when he'd received a call from a man he only knew as Mr. L, asking him to do a job for him. He didn't know who the man was or where he could be found but he did know that they man had resources and no small measure of power. He knew this because his current employer had helped him set up his own operation by taking out his old bosses then handing over to him their business. All he'd been told at the time was that he'd be called on to do certain jobs from time to time and he could not refuse them, no matter what. He hadn't liked those terms at first but after what happened the first and last time he'd tried to say no, he knew better than to defy Mr. L.

His bones still ached whenever he thought of **that** day.

So when Mr. L had called him and told him to get to an obscure town out in the middle of nowhere Kansas to hit the local bank and snag an item from a safety deposit box, he'd inquired about what could be so important that someone would store it in a normal bank that probably had the bare minimum security installed in it. Mr. L had stated that it was those qualities that made it the perfect hiding spot for what he wanted. No one would expect something so important to be hidden in a place so ill equipped to protect it. It sort of made sense but, then again, even if it didn't, he wasn't going to say no or dig deeper for answers. In the criminal world, knowing stuff meant power but it also could mean a swift end, depending on how badly someone wanted certain facts to remain a secret.

_I wonder if I'll have some time to enjoy myself before leaving._ He thought as he placed a cigarette in his mouth and lit it. _Maybe deflower some Mary Sue girl after the local barn yard party or something._

He shook his head as he realized that he'd probably have to leave the town the second he made off with the prize. If he was one of those subtle types, he might be able to get it, get what he was after and then get out again without anyone being the wiser. However he wasn't that smooth an operator. He liked the spotlight, the look in the eyes of the people as he inspired fear in their hearts, and so he'd handle this job with his usual flair then get back to Nevada.

After he dumped the body of the bitch he'd acquired his wheels from before she started stinking up the place too much.

There was only so much a guy could do to cover up the smell with air fresheners and those scent spray can things.

_**Smallville Municipal Bank, Afternoon, Xander's P.O.V**_

"You really didn't need to come with me for this, Aunt Martha," he said as the two of them waited in line with everyone else to see one of the bank clerks. "I'm just signing some paperwork and then taking out twenty dollars of pocket change."

"I know but I needed to speak with the bank regarding a loan for the farm," Martha replied with her usual smile. "We've come up a little short of our goal and will need some money from the bank to keep it going for another year or two."

He didn't know what to say about that so he said nothing. He didn't like hearing about how much financial trouble his current guardians were in and he knew they didn't like talking about it any more than necessary. He wished that he could help them more but his own savings were woefully inadequate and whatever he stood to inherit from his parents was legally locked away until he officially became an adult. That meant at least a year before he could make any sort of contribution to his Aunt and Uncle to help them with their farm troubles.

Looking around the bank for something that would distract him until a clerk was available for him he eventually found his eyes setting on a brown sugar skinned brunette girl about two or three years younger than him. She was sitting with a pair of adults that he presumed were her parents talking to a bank employee about something. He was captivated by her beauty and easily ranked her as being as pretty as Cordy back home. That likely meant she was the daughter of some important and/or wealthy member of Smallville and, thus, completely out of his league in terms of asking for a date. Sure, most guys would take one look at the fact that that the girl was a good two years younger than him and consider her too young but after all he'd been through in Sunnydale, he'd settle for any girl within three years of him that was completely human. Still, he was the newbie at Smallville High and a girl that pretty must be beating off guys with a stick or have a steady boyfriend already. That being the case, he'd have to have something pretty big going for him to get her to even look in his direction, much less agree to a date.

Sadly since neither boatloads of money or power he was pretty much out of luck.

"Something catch your eye, Xander?" Aunt Martha asked with an amused tone in her voice.

Turning back to her, he could see an amused and, dare he say, mischievous look on her face. That was not good and he had a pretty good idea about what was going on inside her head, so the best thing to do was dispel any assumptions she might have. "Yeah; something way out of my price range and best left as eye candy."

"Oh, I wouldn't go that far. Jonathan and I are good friends with her parents." Aunt Martha said, not losing her playful attitude. "From what we've heard, Lana's still single even though some football player's been trying to ask her out."

"That puts an end to it then," he said, recalling how his experiences with jocks went back in Sunnydale. "If there's one thing I've learned it's never get between a jock and the arm candy he has his eyes set on. It leads to bruises and blood every time."

"Oh, she's brushed him off every time. I don't think she's interested in him." Aunt Martha said again, undaunted by his pessimism.

"It won't matter if she's not interested in him. All that'll matter is that this football player is making a play for her and probably won't look kindly on anyone butting in." he said, knowing how the caveman mind of an athlete tended to work. "If this guy catches even a rumor that I'm thinking about asking her out, he'll make sure to stomp that notion out of me and **then** toss me to his buddies to teach me my place in the high school hierarchy or something like that. No thanks."

This seemed to be enough to get his Aunt to quit trying to play matchmaker, or at least convince her to try a different approach than prodding him into asking. He figured it was the latter because, while he and his Aunt had gotten along great since he'd arrived, he didn't think she was the type to try and mess with his personal life.

He was about to turn to see what the state of the line up was when something tripped his spidey senses, causing him to look about the immediate area. He did this covertly since he didn't want to alarm or tip off his Aunt, but he still did his best to look the room over just the same. He didn't find anything on the first pass but on the second one he saw a guy with pumpkin orange hair standing just inside the building wearing a trench coat and scarlet boots. While a bit odd looking it wasn't that which set off his warning senses, but rather the manner in which the man was standing there. The guy wasn't standing there like a fellow bank customer or someone with an appointment to keep, but rather someone who planned to start something dangerous.

Before he could even think up a to feed his Aunt to get the two of them out of the bank, the dangerous man made his move. Unleashing some sort of energy blasts from his hands, he took down the uniformed guards first then the cameras before flash frying the door so that it was sloppily welded shut. At first he thought that it was some sort of mage but he hadn't heard any sort of chant or magic phrase mixed with the firing of the energy blasts, so that left one other option: they were dealing with a mutant.

"Ladies and gentlemen, remain calm and please lay face down on the floor with your hands behind your head," the man ordered with energy covering his hands. "Do as you're told and this'll be quick and relatively painless. Complicate things and I can't promise anything."

Needless to say that the examples the mutant had provided with the guards and the security cameras proved to be more than enough to get quick obedience from everyone. He was no exception because, even though he considered himself good enough to get the drop on your average vamp, he wasn't about to test his luck in this situation. Following his Aunt to the ground, he immediately fell into the position laid out by the mutant and hoped that this really would be a quick and clean op like the criminal had said it'd be. If things got messy, things would get messy and he'd had enough of messy after Sunnydale.

As the mutant headed towards the back of the bank and out of his field of vision, he had to wonder how long it'd be before the local P.D showed up. There were people out on the street, after all, and they'd had to have heard the shouting and seen the light from the energy blasts, so it was a safe bet that the local law enforcement would be on its way soon. The mutant was likely aware of this as well, since he sealed the front entrance. With it fused shut like that, the police would likely have to knock it down in order to get inside and that would create more than enough noise to spoil the element of surprise. It sort of made him wonder what the man's plans were for once he had what he wanted. Did he expect to be gone by the time the boys in blue showed up? Or did he have some trump card ready to make the police presence useless?

He had no answers even as he heard the sounds of metal being torn open and the light heat coming from behind him.

Looking about as best he could without drawing attention to himself he could see just about everyone else was keeping their heads down whimpering in fear.

All save one, that was.

The young girl that his Aunt Martha had identified as Lana Lang seemed to be fiddling with something in her hands. It looked electronic and, based on the finger movements, it looked like she was typing something. A cell phone or instant message device? If so then she was probably trying to get news of what was going in the bank out to the police so they could plan a raid or something. He just hoped that the mutant didn't catch her doing it or else he'd likely be a bit miffed. He couldn't turn around to see how things were going in the back where the vault and other offices were but he could still hear the guy working on things back there. Hopefully Lana would have the sense to make her messages quick and to the point so that they'd be done by the time the crook was finished.

"THAT LYING SONUVABITCH!"

_That does __**not**__ sound good! _He thought as he realized that an angry crook could become a violent crook, depending on how solid a grip the guy had on his temper.

The fact that an energy blast shot out from behind him and demolished the front doors of the bank did not indicate that this guy was the epitome of restraint. Apparently whatever plan the crook had been going by had just blown up in his face big time. Or he was double crossed somehow. Either way it didn't look like this was going to be the minor event he'd been hoping it could be.

The roaring of police sirens followed by the screeching of tires certainly didn't help the situation any.

_Figures! Even away from the Hellmouth, my usual luck finds a way to mess with me!_ He thought as he began to think of just the right way to turn things to his advantage.

"That lying sack of **SHIT**! He calls me all the way from fuckin' Nevada for a milk run only to find a stinkin' empty metal box!" roared the mutant as he stormed back into the main area of the bank, randomly blasting things with his energy powers to vent his fury.

As much as he didn't like the thought, he personally hoped that the mutant decided to focus on the cops outside and completely forgot about civilians. He really didn't want to wind up in a hostage situation, given that with his luck he'd be the one with the glowy fist pointed at his head.

"Hey! What the fuck do you think you're doing, bitch!?" yelled the mutant as he stormed over to Lana and ruthlessly grabbed her by her hair, lifting her off the ground.

"AAAHHHH!" Lana exclaimed in pain as she got to her feet.

"Been reaching out and touching someone, have you?" asked the mutant before he grabbed the cell phone out of her hand and turned into a puddle of melted plastic. "Consider your connection terminated. Permanently!"

At first he thought that the crook just meant the cell phone but, when he turned his energy coated hand towards Lana, it didn't take him half a second to figure out what he had in mind. Looking around frantically, he immediately got to his feet and grabbed the nearest heavy object he could: an electronic pencil sharpener. He knew even before he threw it that it was definitely solid enough to hurt the guy and smiled as it flew through the air right on target for the mutant's head.

A smile that was shattered when the guy, with uncanny easy, blasted it out of the air before it got to within three feet of his head.

"Nice try, hero!" said the mutant with a smile that quickly shifted to a look of anger, "Time to make you a dead one!"

_SHIT!_ He thought before turning to make a run for the nearest bank clerk counter.

Diving over it, he thought for just a moment that he'd successfully managed to get out of the guy's line of fire.

Then something hit him in the back and pain came.

It might have been focused on his back but he could feel a great deal of it cascading up and down his body like a chain reaction. It was like his body had been dead for a long time and, all at once, his synapses were firing like there was no tomorrow. It was a good thing that he didn't have to feel the pain for very long.

Losing consciousness was good for things like that.

_**The Next Day, Smallville General Hospital, Afternoon, Willow's P.O.V**_

_I'm gonna give that mentally deficient doodie head such a tongue lashing, he's gonna wish they'd poured salt on his burns instead of disinfectant!_ Willow growled as she strode down the sterile hospital hallway towards the room where her friend was recovering.

It'd only been this morning that she'd found out that her friend had been caught up in that mutant robbery at the local bank and, while she'd tried to race over to the hospital to see how he was doing, Nell had convinced her to wait. According to what her Aunt had told her, the burns Xander had weren't too serious but that he'd likely be doped up on painkillers at the moment. While she wasn't much of a doctor of the body since her… her parents had been more focused on the mind, she could see the logic of waiting until Xander was a little more coherent to visit him.

Her mind had been completely scattered during the school day, almost made her give the wrong answer a couple of times, but now classes were over with and she was sure that her best bud would be ready to receive a proper lecture from her. How could he have been so stupid!? He knew his anemia made it so he'd come damn close to passing out if he pushed himself too hard! It was stupid to think of trying to take on some energy blast throwing mutant with that sort of condition! He should've just kept his head down and let the police handle the freak and not gotten involved. Then, however, she remembered what happened after her friend got blasted.

The police sniper across the street had finally managed to get a clear shot and put a round through his head. A tad harsh but she supposed there was no other way since a shoulder or flesh wound wouldn't keep a mutant from using their powers. Also because of Xander's interference some girl named Lana Lang was saved from being flash fried by the mutant.

_Xander's White Knight complex strikes again!_ She thought with a roll of her eyes as she finally laid eyes on the door to Xander's room. _I guess I'll have to go easy on him. He can't help but be a heroic idiot sometimes._

She was near her friend's room when something she hadn't expected happened; a teenage girl walked out of Xander's room all alone. She was pretty, if you liked cheerleader looks, long silky brown hair and light brown skin. It wasn't until the young woman turned around that she recognized her as Lana Lang, the woman Xander had saved, and figured she was here to say thanks.

_Must have been nice to finally be thanked for once._ She thought as she waited for Lana to leave before approaching the door to Xander's room.

Yeah, it was one of the most bothersome yet expected things about being a member of the Scooby gang back home. They'd saved so many lives, whether it was with the end of the year apocalypse or just a regular night's patrol through the graveyards. Yet only one out of every fifty or so times did they ever receive anything even approaching a thank you. Most times the people they saved just ran off screaming the second they had an opportunity to run. A lot of the time they just had to go with the whole 'duty being its own reward' bit but she was fairly sure that Xander was feeling better knowing that his act was appreciated.

Walking into the room, she found her friend sitting up in bed looking alright except for the bandages peeking out from his back. Of course she was a bit more focused on the fact that her friend was shirtless and seemed a little more… muscled than she'd thought. Mmmmm…

"Hey, Wills! What's the what?" Xander asked, looking like he didn't have a care in the world.

_Best to let him know where I stand before we get all chummy._ she thought before she fixed her friend with a 'you are in big trouble, mister' look that whipped the grin right off his face.

"Uh… Willow, why are you giving me that look?" Xander asked, sounding a little less sure of the situation than before.

"Maybe I'm giving it to you because you took a stupid risk! Maybe I'm giving it to you because you're in a hospital bed with your back bandaged up!" she exclaimed, getting right up next to him as she lectured him. "What were you thinking, Xander?! That guy could have killed you!"

"So could a dozen other things back in Sunnydale, but that didn't keep me from fighting the good fight." Xander said getting his usual determined look. "Besides, with the way that guy was losing it, I doubt I'd have been all that safe if I'd just kept my head down."

"You don't know that! Look, everything turned out alright this time but we don't have Buffy around anymore to save our bacon when the going gets tough," she said, pointing out the flaw in his position. "I know you want to help people, Xander, but you gotta be pickier about the fights you pick."

For a moment it looked like Xander might start an argument, given that she now remembered how angry her friend sometimes got when someone made it sound as though normal humans couldn't make a difference in the fight against the darkness. However, in a somewhat odd turn of events, the look of defiance melted away to one of reluctant acceptance.

"I know. I just couldn't stand by and watch Lana die." Xander said, sounding unhappy that he lost the argument before it really began.

"'Lana', is it?" she asked, deciding to try and steer things to something a little more lighthearted, "So you're on a first name basis with your damsel in distress?"

"Yeah, well… she came to visit right before you did and…she didn't want me calling her 'Ms. Lang' cause it made her sound like her mother." Xander replied, obviously feeling a little nervous about the direction the conversation was going in. "That's all. Really!"

"Not because she's a pretty girl and you're officially single at the moment?" she asked playfully, liking the look that had sprung up on her best friend's face.

"What? Are you and Aunt Martha gossiping over the phone or something?" Xander asked with a confused look on his face. "She suggested the same thing at the bank before the mutant tore it up."

"More women's intuition than gossip," she said with a smile of amusement. "You always get this look in your eyes whenever you spot a girl you like. You got it when we first met Buffy and you got it when you started to get serious with Cordy. It's like two plus two makes four."

"Somehow I think things are a **little** more complicated than that, Willow." Xander said with a smirk as the amusement at the situation began to spread. "I'll admit she's pretty but she also has a thing going on with the star jock of the football team. Another Larry breathing down my neck I **don't** need."

"True. One Larry Blaisdell is quite enough," she agreed remembering her own less than great encounters with the football player. "So, if I turn this jock Lana is dating into a newt, will you ask her out?"

"I think we'd be the first implicated if you did something like that." Xander said as the smirk expanded into his usual lopsided grin. "It's always the ones with the most to benefit from a disappearance that the cops interrogate first and somehow I doubt Smallville P.D is as gullible as the Sunnydale P.D."

Another good point made.

Without a Hellmouth beneath it, the whole denial syndrome wouldn't be around to make people suppress any weird encounters they might have. Plus, with the whole mutant thing going on, she might be mistaken for a mutant if she tried to do any magic. Living in Sunnydale, up until recently, hadn't given her in the same exposure to the whole mutant hoopla as people living in some of the bigger cities but even she knew that most people put them in the same category as demons. Already there was talk of a Mutant Registration Act being proposed by a Senator Kelley in the Senate but, at the moment, all that was going on was debate. Both sides had their points but she was leaning more towards the people in favor of denying the proposal, if for no other reason than because she and Buffy would likely be asked to register. After all, in a world that didn't believe in the existence of magic or demons, then the term 'mutant' was the next best fit for their abilities. She seriously wasn't looking forward to being lynched or being forced into a gas chamber or something.

"I guess. Guess I'll have to think of something else," she said before a smile of greater amusement blossomed across her face. "Maybe I can mix some laxative into his food while he's on a date with her. Nothing makes a guy look more unattractive then bladder problems."

They both had a good laugh at that before letting the discussion devolve into more typical teenage stuff, like how school was and her handing over the notes for the classes they shared.

Xander was obviously not crazy about having to deal with schoolwork any sooner than he had to.

_**The Next Day, Morning, Smallville General Hospital, Xander's Room, Xander's P.O.V**_

"I'm alright, Aunt Martha! A little sore but nothing I can't handle." Xander said as he tried to swipe away the Kent matron's fussing hands.

"And if you accidently get those burns infected because you pulled those bandages loose?" Martha said sternly as she tried with more determination to help him get his clothes on. "That's not happening while I'm around, mister!"

With a sigh he accepted the fact that he'd never get her to stop mothering him until he was back to one hundred percent and, even then, he'd probably still get fussed over from time to time. However the truth of the matter was that he felt great at the moment and, aside from some tightness around the burn mark on his back, there was nothing else wrong with him. It was odd since there was always a certain amount of fatigue thanks to his anemia but it only really reared its ugly head when he pushed himself. Now, though… now that ever-present level of fatigue that had been dancing in the background of his mind since he'd first collapsed was fading away like an old memory. He didn't know whether it was something he could blame on the medication or something better but he wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth.

As he finished getting his clothes on, he heard the door to his room open to reveal Dr. Alfred Tazu with a smile on his face. He'd been the doctor taking care of him since he'd been admitted and something seemed a little off about the guy. Still, if he was the one calling the shots with the medication he couldn't fault the results.

"So what's the final prognosis, Doc?" he asked with a friendly smile on his face.

"Better than I thought, Xander," Doc Tazu said flipping through some papers he had in his hands. "In fact, I have a rather pleasant surprise for you: your unique strain of anemia appears to be in remission."

"What? What do you mean?" Aunt Martha asked, voicing the surprise all of them were feeling.

"Well, according to your medical records, this anemia was something that was self-perpetuating and that was why conventional methods of treating or even curing it were useless," Doc Tazu explained as he finished leafing through the chart. "Yet somehow the unique energy that the mutant bank robber hit you with has somehow destroyed the part of it that allowed it to defy being completely cured. You're not completely out of the woods yet and I think you should continue taking your medicine until you've exhausted your current supply but, barring another odd jolt to your system, I'd say you're on your way to a better life."

Wow.

That was the only word that best described what he was feeling at the moment and so potent was it that it took his Aunt Martha smacking him upside the head to snap him out of it. Looking down at her, he could see the smile of joy on her face and felt an identical one appear almost instantly as laughter began to spill from his lips. On instinct alone he wrapped his arms around his Aunt and hugged her with all the joy he was feeling at the moment. For over a decade he'd been forced to lead half a life while watching other guys his age enjoy life to the fullest. No sports or anything that could possibly get the blood pumping or the adrenaline flowing. Even the help he provided Buffy with had to be limited because of how weak he got when he pushed things just a little bit too far. To suddenly be told that the chains binding him would be finally be released made it all seem like a miracle!

"Xander…you're…you're hugging me a little hard." Martha managed to get out with some effort.

"Ooops! Sorry, Aunt Martha," he said, quickly releasing her with a bit of embarrassment. "It's just…so **GREAT!**"

"I agree," Martha said as she rubbed her arms a bit. "Not many people get a second chance like this so be sure not to waste it."

"Not a chance," he promised as he mentally swore to grab onto this new future with both hands never to let go.

"Glad to hear it, Xander. Now there's some paperwork that needs to be filled out before you can be formally discharged from the hospital. Shouldn't take more than ten minutes." Doc Tazu said with a genuine smile. "Just be sure to change the bandages on your back once a day for the next three weeks and the burns you received should be gone without leaving so much as a scar."

"Then let's get to that paperwork!" he exclaimed with joy as he all but bounced towards the door to his room. "I might not have Buffy's phobia about hospitals but I'm eager to get some fresh air!"

Without a further thought he followed Doc Tazu out into the hallways of the hospital on his way out into the world no longer hinder by a flaw in his blood.

_**Smallville, Unknown Location, That Evening, Doc Tazu's P.O.V**_

_I knew it was more than just a rumor!_ Tazu thought as he continued to go through the results of his latest battery of tests.

It was almost too much to believe that after a decade of close observation and numerous efforts, his labors were finally beginning to bear fruit. It had been a gamble but, considering that the reward would be enough to get him off of this archaic mudball and back onto a civilized planet, it had been a risk worth taking. He could just imagine his sister, Sazu, when he sent her the information he was just now getting. Her and her position as the handmaiden to the future Queen of their empire! He'd been considered for the position of chief subordinate to the princess but some rather ruthless tactics on the part of his sister had humiliated him in front of everyone. He'd been shipped off to this primitive world with the mission to 'evaluate its potential value as a future addition to the empire', which, of course, was just a fancy way of saying he was exiled to it until the day he died. He'd almost given up hope until the day that the disgrace to humanity, Anthony Harris, walked into his life.

It's been a regular week with him needing some dumb muscle to carry a shipment dropped from scout ship to his humble warehouse and, as usual, he'd employed whoever possessed the least brains and the most brawn. Considering how the aberrations that lived in Sunnydale tended to be attracted by the alien emanations of his supplies, it'd been necessary if he wanted anything to reach him at all. When the foul Harris man had approached him to forge some documents and insert them into America's database, he'd initially just seen it as a way to save some currency for more important matters.

It had been when he'd seen the first test results from the infant's blood that his entire world had tilted on its side. A Kryptonian! The Kryptonian race was known throughout the galaxy for their advanced crystal-based technology and how brave the men of the race were. He'd been notified of the race's extinction as part of his usual briefing on the status quo of the empire but the information he'd received indicated that there were no survivors. He'd been tempted right then and there to notify his immediate superiors since he knew that a search was already going on to find a suitable mate for the princess once she came of age. However he'd stayed his hand and, in doing so, saved himself from a second humiliation.

Among the Royal House, only the strong were chosen to wed its children.

Species of males from across the galaxy were considered as possible mates with their various attributes, both physical as well as mental, being the determining factors. Considering that some species of men were capable of laying waste to cities in the space of a single night or had planned the downfall of lesser empires with ease, just finding a Kryptonian male would not be enough. While it was true the boy had been quite the rare find he would be helpless against some of the more hardy rivals that were no doubt being considered. It was then that he had recalled something one of his less reliable apprentices had once told him about a criminal who'd once sought a place to hide on Earth decades ago. He'd only been partially listening at the time but he remembered a tale of how this criminal had spotted a Kryptonian on the planet, in this very town no less, exhibiting powers unheard of amongst his people. Superior physical prowess, durability that could well stand up to even a heavy cruiser's weapons and a few others that he could not recall at all to this very day. Nevertheless, it'd been that tale that had stayed his hand and kept him from contacting his superiors.

In the years that followed he'd conducted research on the boy, covertly, of course, to determine the source of the power that Kryptonians only seemed to have on this planet. He'd tried various medicinal and chemical concoctions in order to bring about the same sort of abilities in the boy but instead it only seemed to harm the boy. In the end he'd been forced to focus his work on finding a way to purify the boy's body since he'd come to the conclusion that some outside variable was interfering with the emergence of the Kryptonian's powers. He'd had some success with the medication he'd managed to maneuver into the hands of Tony Harris but it would have still take far too long to do its job to his satisfaction.

Then came the accident that took the lives of Tony and Jessica Harris.

He'd been alarmed at first when he'd heard the news, afraid that he'd lose his one way to the boy, but then considered the situation from another point of view. Could some environmental factor be the reason for the lack of superhuman abilities in the sole survivor of Krypton?

It was possible. He had been aware of an undercurrent of dimensional energy coating this small town but, since it hadn't been interfering with his work, he hadn't paid it any mind. Considering that he was making virtually no progress in refining his medicinal attempts to purify the boy's body, he'd chosen to give a change of scenery a try. Packing his things and tying up what loose ends he could, he'd then relocated to the small town of Smallville, Kansas, where his sources said one Alexander LaVelle Harris would be sent to live with his Aunt Martha Kent. It hadn't taken much doing to get him installed as one of the doctors at Smallville General Hospital and just a little more to make sure he was the only one who'd ever gain access to the Harris boy. He'd expected to see results within months of the change location but he had never in his wildest dreams imagined how things would transpire two days ago in the small town's bank. However it had all worked to his advantage, as though guided by the hands of the gods of his people.

He had not been lying when he'd told the young man and the Kents that his 'anemia' was in complete remission. Whatever the outside influence had been that had prevented the Kryptonian from achieving his full potential seemed to have been completely wiped from the boy's system. All that remained was minute residue that he was confident would be gone by the end of the week, if not sooner. He would have to dispatch observational drones immediately in order to monitor the changes as they occurred and, if all went as he prayed it would, he would have a worthy fiancé for his princess… one that would propel him back into the Royal Court and show his sister who the true prodigy of their family was.

_**The Kent Farm, Three Days Later, Early Morning, Xander's P.O.V**_

_I don't know if I've ever had a more perfect morning._ Xander thought as he stood in the loft of the Kent Barn looking at the sunrise on the horizon.

It had been three days since he'd left the hospital and, with every passing hour, he'd felt more alive than ever before. He really had nothing to compare it to since he'd felt the effects of his anemia for almost as long as he could remember. The feeling he was getting, though, standing in the growing sunlight, was definitely something he could get used to quite easily. Taking a deep breath of the morning air, an idea occurred to him that he felt just strong enough about to give it a good try. Up until then he'd only been preparing breakfast for the Kents but now he'd go one step further and try to do some of their less difficult chores for them. He'd seen them do it often enough that he felt he could pull off the less complicated ones without too much trouble. The only thing he'd have to worry about would be getting it all done before Aunt Martha and Aunt Jonathan woke up. Being the farmers that they were, it wouldn't be too long from now so speed would be essential.

_But not at the expense of skill, of course._ He thought as he jogged down the steps to the ground floor of the barn. _Don't want to accidentally get any egg on my face._

As the time passed, though, he found that he was quickly running out of breathing room and if he didn't pick up the pace, he'd barely get anything noteworthy done before the lifelong farmers got up. Thus he kicked things up a notch, going from jogging from place to place to outright running and only coming to a stop just long enough to do what he had to do in a given spot. It was then that he began to notice something a bit odd, even when compared to some of the things he'd experienced in Sunnydale. He'd only caught a glimpse of it the first few times since he was too focused on not screwing up but, as he gained confidence in his abilities, he was able to relax a bit. It was then that he noticed a few strands of straw floating to the ground ever so slowly. At first he'd thought the wind was simply slowing down the vegetation's descent but that didn't fit with what he was seeing. So he came to a complete stop to give the phenomena his complete attention and that's when he got confirmation that something wasn't right.

The strands of straw went from slowly floating down to the ground to dropping to the ground like they were pencils.

"What the hell?" he whispered as his mind tried to come up with a rational explanation for what he'd just seen.

Some spell gone awry that distorted time? Possible, and it certainly looked like some of the special effects and arcane effects he'd seen both in fiction as well as in reality. However the way the super slow mo effect began and ended with him running around cast doubt on that possibility. In fact it pegged him as the source of the anomaly, or at least a controlling factor in when it chose to happen. His mind continued to sort through the possibilities but nothing, whether it be deliberate or accidental, seemed to match the info he had so far.

Then he recalled a possibility he hadn't thought of and all the variables seemed to slide into place.

He was a mutant and this was his mutant power manifesting itself for the first time.

It certainly fit what he'd observed so far but, just to be certain, he'd try to activate it voluntarily and with his full attention on it rather than spotting it out of the corner of his eye. Since running seemed to be the trigger, he'd try to run to the farthest edge Kent Farm but away from the main road. He didn't want to take the chance that someone might spot him. He knew well that the number of people who'd give a mutant a fair shake were severely outnumbered by those that'd lynch someone just for being a suspected mutant. Exiting the barn, he lowered himself into a runner's stance, took a deep breath and then surged forward intent on running as fast as he could.

Moderation definitely should have been kept in mind.

In the blink of an eye the world around him seemed to slow down to a crawl as he ran for the western edge of the farm. It was an odd thing since, from his point of view, it felt like he was just running normally but everything else was moving distinctly abnormally, like everything was underwater. Just when he figured he was about to reach the edge of the property, he braced himself before bringing his body to a complete stop. Like someone flicking a switch, the world's speed suddenly fell into temporal sync with him by moving like it normally did.

_Well I've proven I can turn this power of mine on and off whenever I want but that doesn't tell me what it is._ he thought as he tried to figure out what the power was. _Is it some kind of time distortion ability or just your generic super speed?_

Looking back the way he came, though, he had the gut feeling it was the latter as he watched the dust cloud from his passing settling to the ground. This also meshed with what happened with the straw earlier since, if he was moving fast enough, the vacuum caused by his passing would have stirred it up quite a bit. Of course the next thing he'd have to find out somehow was just how fast he could go but that would have to wait since, according to his watch, Aunt Martha and Aunt Jonathan would be up any minute. Running back towards the house at super speed, it wasn't until he came to a stop at the edge of the field he'd run through that the shock that had kept his emotions suppressed until now dispersed.

He was a mutant.

A whole gauntlet of emotions ran through him as that statement repeated itself in his mind dozens of times over. He was officially a member of a race that most of humanity hated and wanted lined up for execution or imprisonment. All it would take would be one person spotting him using his power and he'd be exposed to all of Smallville for what he was. Then would come the lynch mobs! However, as he thought of the people he'd likely see in that mob, a more personal fear arose concerning how people he was friends with or related to would react. Willow would be reasonable enough since she was already used to the supernatural and Buffy being the Slayer. The Kents seemed like reasonable people but he'd only been with them a short while, so he had no idea how they'd react once they learned their nephew was a mutant. There were only two classmates at the high school he felt were more than strangers to him but neither Lana nor Chloe were close enough to him that he could bank on their bond with him to keep the usual anti-mutant hysteria from compelling them to turn on him. He'd have to take a crash course in controlling his power while trying do a better job than Buffy at keeping his secret a secret.

Walking up casually, but slowly, towards the house, he could see lights, telling him that Aunt Martha and Uncle Jonathan were indeed awake. As he got closer to the back door he'd chosen to enter from, though, he noticed that there wasn't the usual movement he'd seen since he started going to the barn loft early in the morning. Had he missed their getting breakfast? Maybe. He hadn't really looked at the house after he'd started trying to do some of the chores so it's possible he'd missed it. Shrugging it off, he opened the back door and entered as laid back as he always was in the morning ready to tell them that he'd managed to finish some of the easier chores.

He stopped cold when he saw the looks of shock and surprise directed from them to him.

Immediately he knew that they'd seen him use his super speed.

So he did the first thing he could think of to deal with this situation.

"So what's for breakfast?"


	3. A Beginning That's a Bang

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the copyrighted materials contained herein (BtVS/DC comics/Smallville/Others). They are the rightful property of their respective creators and associated companies. I make no profit off of this whatsoever and have no intention of changing this EVER. I write because it's fun and because there are those that enjoy reading my fanfic. Therefore I would appreciate it if you would refrain from taking any legal action against me. I can promise you that whatever you get from me won't cover even half of your legal fees

Note: I am now accepting suggestions/ideas for future chapters. They will have to mesh with already established facts from this and previous chapters and not contradict them in the least. I cannot guarantee that I will employ your idea but if I like it enough I will be sure to mention your name at the beginning of the chapter that utilizes the idea. I am primarily doing this because my muse isn't quite as enthusiastic as she used to be for this fanfic idea and some fresh ideas might reawaken her interest. (No slash and no character bashing AT ALL).

_**Kent Farm, Kitchen, One Hour Later, Jonathan Kent's P.O.V**_

_Even after an hour I don't know what to say to Xander._ Jonathan thought as his body went about its usual morning routine while his mind tried to come to terms with what he'd seen.

It had been only a few minutes before the young man had entered the house that he and his wife had been preparing breakfast for the first time since the Harris boy had arrived. It'd struck them both as a bit odd that Alex wasn't cooking like he usually did but brushed it off as the kid enjoying his newfound good health. It had been an odd sound that had drawn his attention to the window that gave an excellent view of the western side of the farm and what he had seen had left him stunned. One moment it looked like Xander was about to break into a run and the next the teenager vanished in a red and blue blur. The only clue he had been able to perceive of where the lad had gone was the parting of the plants and the brown clouds that sprouted up a short distance behind him. It'd taken a gasp from his wife to snap him out of his shock and, when he turned to her, he knew that she'd seen most of what he'd seen as well. Neither had said a word after that and, by the time their nephew had entered the house, they still were at a loss of what to do aside from look dumbfounded at what had happened. All they could do was seek the comfort of routine and hope that eventually they would receive the inspiration to move onto something more constructive.

So far he had nothing and he could tell that the silence was getting to Xander more than anything. He could only imagine what was going through the teenager's mind. Considering the political and social climate, the fear of being found out as a mutant must be festering within him.

_I might not have any experience dealing with a mutant but I know what it's like to be a young man suddenly in over his head. _He thought as he decided right then to break the silence.

"Look, Xander, I don't know what to say. I have honestly never come across a situation like this before," he said, figuring honesty and sincerity would be best. "What I do know is that even with this power you've been given you're still you where it matters. All you have to decide is this: will you let this new ability be a curse or a blessing?"

Not the most inspiring words he'd ever uttered but they felt right and, judging by the improving look on Xander's face, they were having the desired effect but doubts remained in his eyes.

"Martha and I will do all we can to help you come to grips with this and help you master your new power," he said, making sure that the teenager knew he had two people solidly in his corner. "I can call Principal Kwan and get him to extend your medical leave another two or three days and we can use that time to train you so that you won't use your power by accident."

"How?" Xander asked a flicker of hope and optimism appearing in the depths of his eyes.

"Well we can test to see just how much energy you need to make it work. Once we nail that down, we can drill you over and over until both your mind and body are conditioned completely to keep a lid on your power until you want it to come out. I promise you won't be alone in this Xander."

"Thanks, Uncle Jonathan."

Finishing up breakfast, he didn't waste any time calling Jim over the phone to bargain for a few more days off for Xander, citing head problems and a still lingering burn wound. He'd didn't push it too far to make sure he didn't wind up tripping over his own white lies but by the end he'd managed to get a full four days before Kwan would expect his nephew in law back in class. He hadn't been lying about his lack of experience with the whole super powers business so he didn't know whether or not four days would be enough time for Xander to get a handle on his new gift. Still it was the best he could hope for and asking for more would just cast more suspicion on the situation which was the last thing his family needed. He might be a small town farmer but he was ignorant about the whole mutant situation and how things could take a turn for the worse if others found out about Xander.

He shuddered internally at the images that turn of events brought forth.

In his heart he wanted to believe that the people of Smallville wouldn't be like some of the bigots he'd seen on television but fear and ignorance could make people do things you'd never suspect them capable of. He would just have to work with Xander hard over the next four days and make sure that, by the time he hopped on the school bus, there'd be nothing different that anyone but his closest friends could pick up on. That meant that only Willow would be able to pick up on anything and, based on what Xander had told him about her, the duo seemed close enough that it would take something monumental to shatter what they had.

He just hoped that Xander having powers wasn't going to be that one monumental something.

Feeling a hand come down on his shoulder, he turned to see his wife with a look of comfort on her face, as if trying to convey her belief that everything would work out in the end. Feeling his fears dim a bit looking at her smile, he thanked God once again for bringing the wonderful woman into his life. She gave him strength when he thought no more could be found and often knew just the right thing to say when his own words failed him.

"I know this isn't anything like we'd expected when we agreed to take Xander in but we'll get through this," Martha said softly so that the topic of their discussion wouldn't overhear them. "**Together**."

Placing his hand on top of hers, he gave her a look of determination that made it clear that he was with her on this one hundred and ten percent.

If there was one thing that his father had drilled into him it was loyalty to family no matter what.

_**Smallville High School, Later That Day, Willow's P.O.V**_

"That's all for today class. See you tomorrow," said the English teacher, Ms. Potter, after the final bell rang.

Gathering her things, she swiftly made her way out of the classroom and headed for the front of the school where her Aunt would probably be waiting for her. It was one of the convenient things about living with Nell that the woman's flower shop often slowed down business-wise around the same time school let out. This allowed the older woman to put a 'temporarily out' sign in the window, pick her up and drive her home without losing too much business. Her relative had told her that she wouldn't be able to do it all the time but for next few weeks at least it'd be something she could depend on. Afterwards, though, she'd have to take the school bus along with everyone else and she personally hoped that it'd be better than riding the bus was back in Sunnydale. That was a gauntlet of bullies, snobby bitches and pimple-faced nerds that, at one time or another, made her dread even seeing the torture vehicle never mind getting on it.

Hopefully things in Sunnydale would be more pleasant since there was no Hellmouth to stir things up.

After thinking that, she wondered if she'd just jinxed the whole town but dismissed it as a possibility.

No Hellmouth, in her opinion, meant it was safe to say certain phrases again.

"Hey!" came a somewhat familiar voice from behind her.

Turning around she spotted the blonde form of Chloe Sullivan jogging up to catch up to her with a friendly smile on her face. This struck her as odd since she only had a few classes with the girl but at the same time she thought it'd be nice to make a new friend. At the moment the only person she could call friend was Xander and if she was going to be living in Smallville for the next couple of years, she needed to make connections including friends.

"What can I do for you, Chloe?" she asked while slowing down to let the other woman catch up.

"I was wondering if I could ask you a few questions about Xander," Chloe replied as she brought out a notepad. "I'm writing a story in the school newspaper about the bank robbery and need some background information on the hero of the hour."

It was a new bit of information to know that there was a school newspaper at Smallville High School and that Chloe was apparently a reporter for the paper. She'd known that Sunnydale High School had a newspaper but it was almost always filled with obituaries of both faculty and students, so she'd never read it herself. As for her wanting to know more about Xander, it was odd but not surprising considering how the bank robbery had been such big news in the small town. Even five days after the event, she'd still heard quite a few students talking about it, as well as a few of her Aunt's customers. In the end she supposed that answering a few questions wouldn't hurt so long as she took care not to spill anything too personal that Xander might be angry about later.

"What do you want to know?" she asked with some reservation.

"Well has Xander always been the sort of person to put himself in danger for someone else?" Chloe asked as she jotted something down on her notepad.

"Yeah, he has. Even with his anemia he was always the first to stand up to bullies whenever they came to pick on me or Jessie. There wasn't a whole lot he could do but that didn't stop him from trying, though," she replied with a smile as she recalled the times Xander had shown his bravery. "It got him in trouble sometimes but never could help being a White Knight to people who needed help."

"What sort of trouble are you referring to?" Chloe asked with an enthusiastic grin as she jotted down the information.

"Sometimes he'd have to see the school nurse after getting beat up. Other times he'd be smart enough to plan ahead and bring a baseball bat when he knew there was going to be trouble," she replied, taking time to censor certain facts before speaking. "He got sent to the principal's office often and later on they might as well have had a seat in detention reserved for him. He didn't care, though. To him all that mattered was helping someone who needed it."

"So he's pretty selfless?" Chloe asked, sounding a little skeptical about the picture being painted.

"Well… most of the time he is," she replied recalling some of the more… questionable… moments in Xander's past.

"Most of the time?" Chloe asked, getting the same look Buffy got on her face when she spotted a shiny new weapon.

"Well, when someone he doesn't like got into trouble… o-or something he'd only step in if I made him," she replied, stumbling a bit over her concerns about what she should or should not say.

"So basically if he thinks they deserve the trouble they're in, he'll just watch it happen?" Chloe asked sounding like she disapproved a bit.

"NO! Well not always. If he thinks they're going to get seriously hurt he'll help out but if it's just a few scrapes and bruises then it's what they deserve," she said, quickly coming to the defense of her friend.

"So he's got his own code of justice and sticks to it no matter what?"

"Pretty much. Usually takes some pretty serious convincing or bribes to get him to see things my way."

"So money, girls and booze could get him to change his mind?" Chloe asked, no doubt making a mental list of bribes she could use in the future.

"No…well…girls maybe…b-but they'd have to be complete knockouts and way above the sort you'd see around here," she started babbling as her own words came back to haunt her. "Supermodels or… or something."

"So he's got high standards for the sort of girls he's into then?" Chloe asked, never once losing her pace writing on her notepad.

"Well… sort of…" she replied recalling how her friend always overlooked her for the Buffys and the Cordelias.

Tensing for a moment as she feared that the blonde would pick up on what was going on in her head somehow and do something she was gratified to see Chloe put the notepad away.

"Well I think I've got what I need from a friend's point of view. Add that to the eye-witness accounts and I think I've got my story. Thanks Willow! See ya!" she declared before running off most likely to type up the article.

Pausing for a moment, she hoped that she hadn't caused Xander any trouble but then shrugged her shoulders, figuring that it was better that the girl get some of the truth rather than be left to make it all up on her own. Hopefully it won't be like the tabloids, where everything is blown out of proportion just to sell more copies. Not likely since this was a small town and people wouldn't spend money to buy a high school newspaper when there was something better available.

With the current dilemma resolved, she resumed her trip to the front of the school, hoping that Nell hadn't been kept waiting too long.

_**Stretch Limo, Three Days Later, Mid-Morning, Lionel Luthor's P.O.V**_

"General Langston! So glad you could find time in your busy schedule to speak with me," Lionel said with his usual friendly business manner.

"Let's spare each other the false pleasantries, Luthor. What do you want?" The military man sounded like he was having a rather bad day.

"As you wish. I assume by now you've heard of the rather violent bank robbery by a mutant perpetrator not too long ago in Smallville? Terribly tragic how that young lad was hurt," he demurred, doing his best to show how 'deeply' affected he was by the event. "It's a sad thing when even a small town like that Americans can't be free of the mutant menace. However I'm sure that Trask's Sentinels will be able to prevent such travesties… in about five years or so."

He let the little man think on that for a moment before he moved onto the next phase of his scheme.

"Still, it's anyone's guess how many lives will be ruined or ended by then. A thousand? Ten thousand? A **million**? So many tragedies," he said before putting his price tag out to be seen. "Of course there's an easy solution to the problem if you're up to the enterprise."

"Your little project, eh?" General Langston asked, sounding like he now knew the direction things were going. "Rather convenient that this little bank robbery just happened to be done by a mutant so close to where I am. Almost as if someone had planned it that way."

"That is one way of looking at it. It's too bad that the mutant was killed during the local sheriff's raid on the bank. Now they'll never find the man's employer. Assuming he had one to begin with," he added on quite innocently. Well, as innocently as he could.

"True. I assume what you want from me is the same as what we discussed?" Langston asked, admitting unofficially that tracing the mutant back to its source was slim odds at best.

"Precisely. You will ensure that my people can complete the final phase of testing without outside entanglements impeding our progress or ruining the product's debut?" he specified, making sure that he worded things in a way that wasn't obviously incriminating just in case the General was recording the conversation.

"Sounds easy enough… but it's going to be costly to turn that many heads. Costly like say… ten million to begin with."

_Greed. It's such a sad thing but the good general is getting up there in age,_ he thought as he realized what the military man was attempting. _He probably sees this as an opportunity to acquire a retirement nest egg. A reminder of who is truly in the superior position is needed, I think._

"Perhaps. Just be sure not to spend it all on that lovely young lady you met at 4th and Rodenberry last year. Cherry, I think her name was. Rather ironic since I'm relatively sure a woman in her profession lost it long before she met you."

"You slimy little snake in the grass!" growled the general as he realized what was at stake now.

"Now, now General Langston! Let's not ruin a perfectly civil conversation with name calling," he said with a smile as the man foolishly let him know he'd hit a nerve. "All you need to do to keep your little tryst a secret from your darling wife Celeste is hold up your end of our little bargain. Do that and not only will your secret remain just that but you could walk away with enough money to retire on. A fair deal, wouldn't you say?"

"Like hell it is!? Deal's off, Luthor! Don't call me again and if you even think about spilling your guts to the media keep in mind that I know enough about you to ruin you **permanently!** Goodbye!" General Langston roared before the connection broke by what was no doubt a thunderous hanging up of the phone.

He sighed at the action but it wasn't entirely surprising considering that it was the man's short temper that had prompted him to ensnare the fool in his debt. It hadn't been an entire waste of time but he had been hoping that the old warhorse would have been a tad more flexible so that more use could have been gotten out of him. However it was one of the basic rules of business that whenever you enter into a risky business venture, it was always a possibility that your partner could get cold feet.

_It is also a basic rule of business to tie up loose ends before they become a problem,_ he thought as he accessed the Luthor Corp network and navigated to server only he had access to. _Fortunately Luthor Corp supplies a wide variety of electronics and equipment to the United States military, both of which have been known to include quite a few surprises._

Typing one final command into the system, he watched as the icon that interested him the most blinked amber for two seconds before turning blood red.

_Fitting, considering how much blood is likely now decorating the General's office at the moment._ He thought with a satisfied grin as he engaged the cleaner program to ensure that any phone records linking him to the General's final moments would be removed.

He'd likely still have to answer some questions depending on precisely how much information Langston had actually managed to acquire on him, but if made sure to relocate or remove anything incriminating on his end, all that would be left would be slanderous accusations.

_Nothing a quick call to my lawyers can't hush up._ H_owever this little turn of events means that I no longer have a way to safely test BB93 without potential exposure._

Indeed, while Langston wasn't the only military officer he had under his thumb, he was the only one he had sufficient knowledge of to force things to go his way. All the rest had been considerably more discreet in their behavior and, while not spotless, did not have a black mark that would bend them to his will. It was as he considered the possibilities that an idea occurred to him that potentially could solve all his issues. It would require a review of his cannon fodder file but, with just the right timing, it could work to his benefit and present his son Lex with a suitable challenge at the same time.

His son had been something of an annoyance ever since he'd had to cover up the embarrassing event at Club Zero. While he was unsure of the details, he imagined it was yet another mistake on his son's part when it came to choosing women to associate with. He had managed to hush up his wayward son's involvement in the death, placing the blame solely on Max Kasich while painting Lex as the innocent bystander.

Nevertheless he was growing tired of having to clean up his son's messes and believed that the best way to force his heir to grow up would be to give him some responsibilities. They would show him firsthand that his actions had consequences beyond a lecture from him and hopefully result in tempering the young man's more reckless tendencies. He had been debating for a while now just what form those responsibilities would take and, up until now, had thought merely to put Lex in charge of the Smallville fertilizer plant, but now believed he had something better in mind.

Pulling out his phone, he dialed the number that would put him in contact with the head of the BB93 project. It took a few rings but eventually it was picked up on the other end.

"Mr. Luthor, what a surprise! I presume you're calling to inform me that our… cloak of invisibility has been secured." Dr. Jefferson stated with a bit of nervous energy.

"Unfortunately, no. It would seem that the General was not flexible enough to see our point of view," he replied, trying to put the woman at ease since it would make the conversation more bearable. "I'm afraid I will have to ask you to prepare all of the substance for travel to our Oklahoma facilities. I expect that members of the ignorant will be at your door within the week."

"O-of course! I'll begin the preparations immediately," Janice stated confidently as she tried to suppress her anxiety. "Will we be transporting all of it at once or in shipments?"

He considered that for a moment as it was a rare valid question that was not commonly heard coming from the lips of the good doctor, despite her acceptable education. It took him a moment but in the end he decided on the proper course of action.

"We will do it in three smaller shipments dispatched every second day in order to avoid drawing attention to them. I trust that you will be able to handle the details?" he asked with a bit of an edge to his voice, implying displeasure if she couldn't handle such a simple task.

"Of course, Mr. Luthor. Everything will go precisely as you desire," Dr. Jefferson stated a bit more loudly but certainly firmly enough to allay his more immediate concerns.

"I know it will. One way or another." He said before disconnecting the call from his end.

The woman might have been one of the foremost geneticists of her generation but he would bet next month's budget that all it would take to shatter her to pieces would be the mere mention of being publically humiliated. In fact he had sufficient evidence and information on her to do just that should she prove to be more of a problem than an asset. Depending on how his plan turned out, he may just have to make use of the skeletons of hers that he'd located.

Such were the sort of decisions he made every day.

_**Six Days Later, Smallville High School, Noon, Xander's P.O.V**_

"So? Is she still following us?" Xander asked casually as he grabbed his home made lunch from his locker.

"Yep. Notepad in hand and everything," Willow replied sounding a little annoyed at what had been happening for the past five days straight.

Ever since he'd come back to school there was a certain blonde shadow that had been following him around almost all the time. The only rest he got from the young woman was when he had to go to the bathroom and he had a feeling that she'd find a way around that particular obstacle soon enough. While it had only been a brief moment, he knew who was following him and, based on what his best redheaded friend had told him, he knew why. Chloe Sullivan had apparently decided to do a follow up story on him after her first story on the attempted bank robbery resulted in a fifteen percent increase in sales for the school newspaper, "The Torch". The girl was like a pitbull now and likely wouldn't stop following him around, looking for a story unless something even more interesting popped up. It'd certainly make using his super speed a little more difficult and force him to use standard transportation to get around town. Not that he had a whole lot of need to use his super speed, given how quiet Smallville was and how slow paced his schedule, but he still enjoyed using it from time to time. Hopefully the girl would eventually get bored about the lack of results and just leave him be. It might have been a fantasy of his to be the object of a girl's attention but this was bordering on stalkerism and that was just plain freaky, especially considering some of the big bads back in Sunnydale.

"I wonder if I'd be able to scare her off if I told her that I was into S&M or something," he asked her quietly and was rewarded with a giggle.

"I wouldn't try it, Xander. She just might be into that sort of thing." Willow laughed with a bit of warning in her voice.

"Mistress Chloe… has a nice ring to it."

"XANDER!" Willow exclaimed before smacking him in the shoulder.

"Don't worry, Willow. You know no one whips me quite like you," he said with humorous submissiveness.

This caused his best friend to quiet down almost immediately as her face turned tomato red in embarrassment at the images he'd no doubt just put in her head. It was always good fun to mess with Willow a bit but she knew it was all in good fun and that he'd never intentionally hurt her, whether it be with words or with fists. His foster father Tony Harris had showed him by example just how wrong that was and her refused to become anything like that drunken sonuvaBITCH! Brushing those negative thoughts away, he decided to focus on something a little more pleasant.

"So? Eat our lunch out on the picnic tables?" he asked while leading his friend in that direction.

"Sounds good."

It had been a tradition the last couple of days that they'd always choose a different part of the school to have their lunch in order to become more familiar with the place as a whole. It'd also help him figure out where the best places would be for him to make a hasty exit with his super speed without being spotted by anyone. He didn't think there were many demons or vamps that had even heard of Smallville, much less visited it, but he wasn't deluded enough to think that he wouldn't encounter any trouble of that sort while he stayed with his Aunt and Uncle. While he wasn't sure if it was his luck or the luck of his adoptive parents that had rubbed off on him, he was certain that if he wasn't careful he'd wind up the proverbial creek without a paddle.

It didn't take them long to reach an empty picnic table and without pause they sat down to dig into their respective meals. He was lucky in that his lunch was prepared by his Aunt Martha, who was a wicked cook that could give Mrs. Summers some competition. He had yet to taste any of her deserts so he'd have to wait before he'd have something to compare to the famous Summers chocolate chip cookies. He was just taking a drink of the Pepsi he'd purchased when something flew through the air and knocked the bottle out of his hand, spilling the contents all over the grass.

Mentally cursing the bad luck, he watched as a local blonde jock just jogged up to where the object, a football, had come to a stop and picked it up before starting to jog back to where his buddies were waiting. If this had been a month ago, he'd have just let it go and thought up a few fantasies about how he'd like to get even with the jock but ever since he'd been freed of his anemia, he'd found a wellspring of both strength as well as courage within himself. Getting up from the picnic table, he stepped into the path of the jock preventing him from going anywhere.

"What do you want, dweeb?" asked the jock in a dismissive manner.

"Well I'd like an apology for spilling my drink but I'll settle for you covering the cost of another bottle."

"Yeah right! Get lost." Sneered the blonde teenager as he tried to go around.

Not happening.

He immediately moved and got in the moron's way again glaring at him all the way.

"Get out of my way, loser!" demanded the football player, sounding like he was beginning to get angry.

"Not until you say you're sorry or cough up the two bucks I need for the drink."

Predictably the jock tried to grab him either to punch him or push him out of the way but his movements were nothing when compared to what a demon could do and, thanks to the training he'd had in his powers, it looked like the guy was moving in slow motion. It was tempting to make a fool of this guy by using his super speed to dodge every attack but he had enough sense to know that drawing attention to himself like that. People were wary already of ordinary people possessing seemingly extraordinary abilities because it usually meant that they were mutants. If he gave others a reason to suspect him of having super powers, it'd only cause more problems for the Kents and everyone else that he cared about. So instead he'd end this quickly using the few moves that Giles had taught him so he could make the most of his moments of strength back in Sunnydale.

Grabbing the jock's arm, he moved as swiftly as he could without appearing superhuman and executed a simple Jujutsu throw.

Or at least it should have been simple but instead of being thrown to the ground just hard enough to knock the wind out of the football player's sails, it turned out to be something more. It turned out to be a throw that all but caused the jock to bounce when he hit the ground and, when the guy didn't get right back up, he was worried enough to drop to one knee to check for a pulse. He was gratified to feel a fast but steady heartbeat and was further happy to see the athlete begin to move again, albeit weakly. Getting back to his feet, it didn't take him too long to notice that just about everyone's eyes were on him with a mix of amazement and suspicion.

Not good.

Still, running away would only make matters worse so he decided he'd give a feasible reason for what happened before the imaginations of the crowd manufactured something without him.

"That, my good jock, was an example of why you should never underestimate someone. I've only taken a couple of Jujutsu classes but I was still able to throw you onto your back," he said as he walked back to Willow and sat down. "Next time you knock someone's drink over, have the decency to make up for it somehow."

There. He'd given them a reasonable explanation for how he'd been able to throw the blonde caveman and put the moron in the wrong. Hopefully this would be enough to make everyone dismiss anything else and allow him to get on with his day. Seconds ticked by and, for a moment, he was afraid he'd have to do something more to get everyone else to let the incident slide. However then the noise level of the area went back to normal and no one seemed to pay him any undue attention. He let out a sigh of relief at this and went back to his meal that he'd now have to find something else to wash down now that his pop was all over the grass. That was until someone new placed a can of pop next to his hand.

Looking up he found out that it was Chloe, who had a grin on her face but oddly no notepad in her hand.

"Thanks."

"Hey, for taking Whitney down a peg in front of everyone, I'd have given you an entire vending machine full of Pepesi if I had the money," she declared before sitting down next to him. "Ever since him and the football team won the team's two hundredth victory, they've been acting like they're gods or something. It's nice that someone showed everyone just how normal they really are."

"Yeah, well, back in Sunnydale we had jock problems too but this is the first time I've actually done something like this," he said, trying to treat it like it was nothing. "Hopefully he and his buddies won't gang up on me after school."

"Well, if I were you, I'd think about sneaking out of the school a couple minutes before the final bell. Whitney and his pals are many things but forgiving isn't one of them," Chloe stated with a bit of seriousness in her voice. "Head out of one of the side entrances and you should be able to give them the slip for today."

"Thanks, Chloe." He said with genuine gratitude for helping him avoid another possible confrontation. He might not want to look like a coward but neither did he want to risk a situation where his secret might be exposed.

_**The Outskirts of Smallville, A Van parked on a Dirt Road Near the Highway, **_

_**Two and a Half Hours Later**_

"Here's the job, boys: in precisely half an hour a tanker truck will be coming down the highway carrying a substance inside of it that our client is willing to pay top dollar for. The guy's even gone so far as to provide us with a means of storing the stuff," a man dressed in black military gear said as he patted the complex looking tanks beside him. "The plan will be a three step process. Step one will be your job, Rose. You will use the civilian car we acquired to block the highway and pretend to be the typical damsel in distress. This will stop the truck and will signal the commencement of step two.

"Step two will be your responsibility, Jericho. You and your team will move our second and third vehicles behind the truck to make sure it can't turn around." He pointed out the place on the map he'd posted up for all to see, "You're team will then exit the vehicles and secure your immediate area, eliminating any witnesses that come close enough to identify us. Spare no one.

"Step three will begin once the immediate area is secured. My team will move in with these tanks and begin siphoning the substance. Once both tanks are filled, we will place explosives at key points on the truck, set the timers for five minutes and then vacate the area. The local and state authorities will be so focused on containing the aftermath that pursuit won't happen for at least twelve hours."

"Where are we to drop off the cargo?" Rose asked with her usual sharpness.

"Our employer said he'd contact us with a suitable drop off point once he's satisfied that we've completely escaped the authorities," he replied, not sounding happy about lacking that particular detail.

His daughter didn't sound like she liked it either but it was not their job to question their employer about such a minor detail.

"Gather your things and be ready to move out in ten minutes. Move out!" he ordered before turning his back to his team.

"As you command, Lieutenant Colonel Wilson!" replied most of them save his children.

It wasn't a new thing for them. Ever since their mother died, making him responsible for their well-being, he'd done his best but they still saw him as a man who deserted their mother. The only reason he could come up with for them agreeing to become a part of his mercenary group is because they wanted to learn the skills they'd need to kill him in a couple of years.

Not that he had any problems with that. If he got so old that a pair of rookies like them could kill him, then he was no longer fit to possess the title of 'Deathstroke'.

_**Thirty Minutes Later, The East Exit of Smallville High School, Xander's P.O.V **_

"Looks like the coast is clear, Wills." Xander said as he looked about the immediate vicinity of the way they'd chosen to sneak out of the building. "Let's go before the cavemen rub two brain cells together."

"I doubt they have one brain cell between the lot of them," she said with a smile as they quickly made their way off High School property.

He had to smile as well at that because it was pretty rare to find a jock that had a decent brain inside of his head, as well as a kind heart. He wasn't about to bet his continued well-being on the off chance that one of them might be nice enough to tell their friends to back off. They continued to take side roads and alleys until they were a good three blocks from the school before emerging onto the sidewalk. Willow had already called her Aunt Nell and asked the woman if she wouldn't mind meeting them at the flower shop and driving them home. It'd taken spilling some of the truth, dodging angry jocks, but the woman had agreed to it without much prodding.

Walking down the street, everything seemed to be peaceful, enough which should have been his first clue that something bad was going to happen. While he wasn't a big fan of the concept of a cosmic balance, he'd seen enough to know that there existed a counter system between good and bad luck, wherein if you had too much of one the other would show up sooner or later to even things out. He'd had good luck by beating the jock at lunch and avoiding Chloe's inquisitive reporter mind but, with his evasion of an after school beating, the counter system had decided it was time to balance things out.

It started as a soft thumping noise in the direction of the highway but what followed didn't fill him with the warm fuzzies. A large cloud of green gas soon surged into the sky before taking on a pace more common from gas being blown by the wind. He didn't know what it was but he seriously doubted that a cloud that sort of color could be considered a good thing in anyone's book. Deciding to err on the side of caution, he grabbed Willow by the arm and the two of them ran the rest of the way to Nell's flower shop.

"Willow? Xander? What's wrong?" Nell asked as she walked out from behind the cashier counter.

"There was some sort of explosion outside of town and now there's some sort of gas being blown this way!" He replied as he began to look about the room for the different ways the gas could enter the store. "We need to plug up all the different ways it could get in here, pronto!"

"Gas?! Are you sure it's heading this way?" Nell asked, sounding distinctly more alarmed than before.

"No way of knowing without some way of telling which way the wind is blowing," he replied as he grabbed the doormat and began to push it into the space between the door and the floor. "Could be heading this way or it could go the other way but best not to take chances until we know what the hell it is."

"What about your Aunt and Uncle?" Nell asked as she used a nearby tablecloth to make a window more airtight.

"Their farm is on the other side of town. The gas will have to blow by us before it gets to them," he replied, his concern spiking for a moment before settling down a bit.

"Unless they've come into town or have business on the side of town that the gas is coming from," Willow said almost absentmindedly as she moved to block the back door of the flower shop.

"Not helping, Willow!" he exclaimed as he paused in mid-movement before resuming his search for the various air vents that might be in the building.

Nevertheless, it was a good point. He didn't know what Aunt Martha and Uncle Jonathan's schedule was for the day, so they could literally have been anywhere in Smallville or on the outskirts. If they got caught up in that cloud and it turned out to be harmful then there was no telling what would happen. They could be killed or infected with some kind of disease! He couldn't let that happen!

Moving back to the front door he pulled the mat out of where he'd stuffed it minutes ago and opened the door.

"Xander? Where are you going?"

"I have to make sure Aunt Martha and Uncle Jonathan are alright. If they're anywhere in town I need to get them to safety."

He gave Willow a meaningful look in the hopes that she'd realize what he intended to do and was rewarded when she gave him an acknowledging sharp nod. "Alright! Just be careful." She said with extra emphasis on the word 'careful'.

"Aren't I always?" he said before jogging away from the shop to the nearest alleyway.

As soon as he was deep enough into the alley that he could be sure no one could see him, he took off at top speed and began searching the town for the couple that had taken him in. He did his best not to stop or slow down enough for people to get a good look at him but just the same he needed to pause every once and awhile in order to be certain. However, as he passed through towards the edge of Smallville that would soon be engulfed by the gas, he began to hear a sound that stopped him in his tracks: He heard screams of pain and suffering.

That was confirmation enough for him that whatever the gas was, it wasn't healthy for human beings. This urged him on as he resumed his super speed search of the town for his Aunt and Uncle, not wanting to even think of what they could be going through if he didn't find them in time.

Faster and faster he moved but, as time passed, so to speak, he couldn't find them anywhere and hoped that that meant they were safely back at the Kent farm.

He was just about to head back to Nell's flower shop when a car came roaring in from the highway, erratically going from one side of the street to another at high speed. Worried that someone might get hurt if things continued, he ran up alongside of the car with the intent of getting control of it somehow. However, when he looked into the driver's side window, he saw a sight that almost made him lose his stride and fall to the ground.

The people in the car were **changing**.

They were changing shape and, unless he was mistaken, one of the ones in back was into a substance that looked like liquid metal. It was a family, that much he was certain of, but the changes they were undergoing were causing them such pain that it was a miracle that the person behind the wheel was able to maintain as much control of the vehicle as he/she had up until now. Opening the door, he grabbed the steering wheel and tried to guide the vehicle to the side of the road while at the same time maintain his current running speed. It wasn't easy since the person behind the wheel seemed determined to keep the car going forward but eventually the pain of what he was going through sapped his strength, causing him to go limp in his seat. It was only seconds later that he watched the driver melt into an unidentifiable substance but he was still able to keep enough of his focus on his job that he was able to bring the car to a complete stop.

That was about all he could do, though, since he was neither a scientist nor doctor and he had no idea how to help them.

_I've got to stop this!_ He thought as he imagined how things would go with the rest of the town if they wound up getting a dose of the gas.

Wracking his brain for a solution, the only thing he could come up with was something he'd read about in a comic book, so it'd have to do. Thus he took off pushing the upper limits of his super speed and began to circle the edges of the gas cloud in an effort to contain the dangerous vapor. In the comic book, the hero was able to manipulate the air pressure with his super speed so that he could keep the dangerous gas in the middle before directing it away from innocents. He was attempting the same trick. However the problem with running at super speed though was that the surrounding world was moving at super slow motion, so it seemed to take forever, but he could see the green gas moving in the right direction. Encouraged by this, he maintained his pace until he was certain that the entirety of the jade cloud was under his control before modifying his path so he could take the dangerous substance away from Smallville. It wasn't until he was beginning to feel the burn from his exertion that he realized he had no idea where to take the stuff or contain it, aside from what he was doing. Racking his mind, he tried to think of a way out of his current predicament when he recalled something about water being a good way to neutralize some poisonous gasses. With that in mind he began to direct the green cloud towards a river he'd gone past a few times with Aunt Martha in the truck. It wasn't a lake or anything but it was closest and right now that was what mattered the most.

_I'm going to be hungry enough to eat a horse after this!_ He thought as he did his best not to screw things up.

When he finally reached the river, though, he was forced to leap across the water since he was fairly sure that he wasn't fast enough to run on water like the comic book hero. It messed with his control of the gas a bit but thankfully his speed was such that it didn't matter all that much in the end. Now, though, he had to figure out how to get the gas into the water and that was straining his little brain.

_Maybe if I started running in the opposite direction?_ he thought before doing just that. _Worth a shot!_

By this point he was truly beginning to feel fatigue but, just like he used to back in Sunnydale when his anemia began to act up at a crucial moment, he pressed onward towards his goal. Hundreds of innocent lives were at risk including those he considered family and friends. Failure was not an option. With determination as his fuel and bravery as his engine, he pushed his body to meet the needs. Bit by bit the gas did what he desired by becoming one with the water, turning it to a darker color than was before. As the last bit of it entered the water, he realized something.

The water was now polluted and if someone drank from it the effects of the gas could still hurt someone.

With what strength he had left, he ran ahead of what he could see of the gas/water mix and began to use whatever was handy to form a makeshift dam. Whether it was wood, dirt or garbage, he used it in the construction of his barrier at a speed that was beginning to drop back to something approaching the upper limits of what a normal human could do. Once he was satisfied with this improvised dam, he did his best to go to the other end to make sure that the tainted water didn't flow the other way somehow. It took longer this time to make a dam and, by the time he was done, he was not only filthy but tired as well.

_I'd better get out of here, _he thought as he began to enter the nearby woods using his memory to navigate towards Smallville proper. _The police will probably be here soon to sniff around. _

_**Four Hours Later, HAZMAT Command Tent**_

"Give me a sit-rep, Agent Carter," ordered the cigar-smoking man on the computer screen.

"Not good, General, but not as bad as it could have been," Agent Carter said as she began sending the information collected so far from what the techs said was ground zero. "Near as we can tell, a tanker truck carrying an bio-genetic cocktail was being transported past Smallville when it was ambushed by mercenaries. They botched siphoning of the substance, resulting in an explosion that released the contents in gaseous form and then was blown in the direction of the town."

"Any ID on the perps?" asked the General, who seemed to be mulling over the info. "Or the owners of the tanker?"

"Pulled up IDs on two of the dead perps but it was a near thing. Both have run with a variety of organizations but intel puts their last employer as Deathstroke," she replied, knowing what would come next.

"Not like Slade to be sloppy like this. Met him once overseas and always looked to be a straight up professional," commented the General before taking another puff of his cigar.

"That's what I thought so I'm having our tech heads go over the area for any sign of sabotage or faulty equipment. As for the truck, all I can say is that it belongs to a transport company in Metropolis. I sent agent's Nelson and Travers to follow up on that end," she stated before receiving the latest report on the civilian population. "Right now I'm betting on one of the big three companies there being involved. Based on the preliminary analysis of the substance, there's no way anyone else could have put it together."

"Any idea what it was supposed to do?" asked the General, who was probably dreading the Charlie Foxtrot things were turning into.

"I have… suspicions. While ninety-five percent of those affected by the gas cloud died, the remaining five percent have begun to exhibit superhuman abilities. A teenager by the name of Hawkins is showing signs of being an EM generator, one Garfield Logan has transformed into six different green animals so far and a redhead by the name of Kincaid has been transformed into a mass of liquid metal. At least we think it's Cessily Kincaid, since the rest of the victims in the car had ID on them belonging to the Kincaid family. The girl is having a lot of trouble keeping a humanoid appearance with some areas of her body melting a bit."

"So you think this gas came from an experiment to create super humans? Like Weapon X?" asked the General, not sounding like he was in a good mood one little bit.

"Possibly. However I don't think it's been tested on humans before now." She picked up one of the newer reports she'd been given, "The effects are too random and chaotic. There'd be no way of knowing what super power a person would receive or how powerful it would be."

For a few minutes there was silence as the General looked to be debating the various courses of action open to them. She could only imagine what he would choose to do. If it was her calling the shots, though, she'd order the entire town placed under quarantine until they had an accurate record of every living person possessing super powers as well as what they could do. Once their files on those people were completed, the quarantine would be lifted and those with useful abilities as well as being old enough would be approached for the Avengers Initiative. It was still in the planning stages, of course, and perhaps a little early to be recruiting members but if the General's timeline prediction was accurate, sooner would be much better than later.

"Continue co-ordinating emergency relief and examination of the area," ordered the General as he took the cigar out of his mouth. "Once things calm down you'll be assigned command of the observation team stationed just outside Smallville. While some of the affected might have been just passing through, most are residents and that means someone is going to have keep an eye on them."

"Is it wise to allow those with powers such freedom, sir? We have no idea just how powerful some of them are or what they might do once they leave Smallville," she pointed out.

As long as they were quarantined they had control of the problem as well as the information that got out to the rest of the world. If they did as the General proposed, it'd only be a matter of time before every third world dictator and corporate C.E.O tried to get their hands on the substance that could give an ordinary human super powers, even if it meant distilling the stuff from those already changed by it.

"Perhaps so, but unduly confining them will only make them less co-operative both now and in the future. Your 'listening post' will be enough to keep tabs on the locals and those that choose to leave we will monitor electronically, since they all seem to live in major cities," the general explained in a serious tone. "Until they show even a hint of being a threat to the civilian population, we can't hold them against their will. Monitoring them will have to suffice for now."

"Yes, sir," she stated with some reluctance at being assigned babysitter to a batch of newly made super humans.

"Don't sound too disappointed, Agent Carter. You'll have more to do than just monitor the new super teens," the General said with an amused grin on his face. "There's also the matter of the super powered individual that kept the entire town from being affected by the gas cloud."

True.

Not all of the agents she'd sent out to investigate that matter had come back yet but, from what she'd been told so far, there appeared to be a human out there capable of running at speeds approaching Mach two. They couldn't be certain since all they had to make this estimate was security footage and eye witness accounts of events but, until proved otherwise, she would consider it accurate. Impressive, since it exceeded the maximum recorded speed of the mutant criminal Pietro Maximoff and thus worth locating for recruitment purposes.

While she still didn't like the idea of being assigned to nowhere-ville Kansas, the potential long term for her career, if she could be the one to get most of the recruits for the Avengers Initiative to sign on it, would be a sure fire way to advance her career.

"Quite. Very well, I accept this assignment and strive to meet your expectations, Genera," she stated officially before saluting.

"I'm sure you will, Agent Carter. Fury out."

_**Luthor Corp Tower, Approaching Lionel Luthor's Office, Afternoon, Same Day, **_

_**Lex Luthor's P.O.V**_

_I wonder what lecture he's going to use __**this**__ time. _Lex thought as he walked down the hall of the top floor of Luthor Corp Tower towards his father's office. _Hopefully one of the shorter ones._

He'd been through three such meetings before now since the incident at the club and each time his father all but called him a failure. Not that he'd heard any great words of praise from his father ever before in his life but it usually took something significant to earn more than a disappointed look from him. In this case it took a death in front of numerous witnesses as well as a security camera, if what he'd learned was accurate. Obviously his father had been forced to dip quite deeply into his pockets and open his closet full of skeletons to sweep it all under the carpet. In the past this is where it would end but he had a feeling that his father was going to up the stakes a little.

Not even bothering to wait for his father's toady Dominic to announce his arrival, he walked right into the office of the C.E.O, where he saw his father in the middle of a phone call. That worked to his advantage since it allowed him to get the first hit in against the old man in the little war of willpower they often engaged in. Moving over to the liquor cabinet, he poured himself a drink from the most expensive bottle he could find while listening in on the phone conversation.

"Make sure that the renovations are done to my precise specifications. I'm expecting almost every room to be occupied and time is not on our side," Lionel said while sending a momentary glare at his son. "Do what you have to just get it done!"

With that the C.E.O of Luthor Corp hung up the phone, looking quite irritated and that, he decided, was deserving of a toast. Briefly raising his glass before taking a sip, he waited for his father to begin his grand presentation.

"Well, at least you have the good taste to pick a good vintage, Lex," Lionel said before walking over to pour a glass for himself. "I'd savor it if I were you. It is likely to be the last quality alcohol you'll partake of for quite a while."

"You sending me to Luthor Corp's Antarctic installation, Dad?" he asked jokingly, since he doubted that his father would go that far with his punishment.

"Why would I send you to a place in the middle of nowhere?" asked his father rhetorically, as though he found the whole question absurd. "You wouldn't learn anything there that would help you when you come into your inheritance. Instead I plan to make you in charge of two business ventures that require a Luthor's touch to become successful."

"What? Pillaging and plundering?" he asked sarcastically, making their family sound like bandits or pirates.

"Not quite. The first is the Luthor Corp fertilizer plant in Smallville, Kansas. Productivity levels have been dropping and profits along with them. I'll expect you to get levels back to where they should be," his father dictated, clearly not impressed by the sarcasm. "The other is a more recent development. I assume you've at least had presence of mind to pick up a newspaper in the last few days or watch the news broadcasts on TV?"

"I might have skimmed a few pages," he replied sharply, not liking the insinuation that he didn't keep up with current events.

"Then you're aware of the attack on the tanker truck outside of Smallville resulting in its contents being released over a quarter of the town. Ninety-five percent of those exposed died from the exposure but the remaining five percent, amazingly enough, have gained superhuman abilities." His father clearly favored this part of the explanation, "Most are residents of Smallville, with only a few being people just passing through. However a situation has arisen in the last day or two that has caught my attention.

"While some of the families of those who've received super powers have welcomed their relations back with open arms, others have renounced all ties with their gifted kin. Considering the rising anti-mutant sentiment among the general population, it's likely those families rejected their kin tossed them in the same pile as the mutants. At the moment the government is providing food and lodging for them but I doubt it'll last. Eventually the press will lose interest and there will be no reason to put on a good show for the public."

"Is there a point to this or is it just a lesson in the cruel nature of the world?" he asked, beginning to lose his patience.

"The point, Lex, is that there is now a group of people possessing a wide variety of superhuman abilities without homes to go to in a country where the number of businesses willing to hire mutants aren't even worth mentioning. They are alone, they are afraid and very soon they will be without a means of supporting themselves short of crime. That makes them vulnerable. I plan on converting our ancestral home outside Smallville into a dormitory of sorts for those unfortunate individuals. They will have a roof over their heads and food enough to satisfy even the most voracious of appetites."

"And you'll be doing this out of the kindness of your own heart?" he asked, not believing for one moment that his father was doing this for altruistic reasons.

"Be realistic, son! There's a war looming on the horizon and the deciding factor won't be guns or bombs but superpowers," his father scolded with a ruthless look in his eyes. "Whichever army, whichever force, has soldiers possessing the strongest of abilities they will decide the course this world will take. In exchange for my benevolent assistance, I intend those individuals to work for me."

"I assume my job then is to put a friendly face on the whole operation and endear them to the idea of working for Luthor Corp." He really should have seen this coming, he really should have. "Or would they working for you, personally?"

It was just like his father to take advantage of other people's weaknesses and vulnerabilities for his own gain. He even suspected that his father was at this very moment gathering leverage on each of the super powered individuals he predicted would accept his invitation, just in case they became 'resistant' to the idea of being employed by a Luthor. Whether the leverage would come in the form of trouble for them specifically or their families, he didn't know. Probably both.

"I wouldn't object to one of them becoming my personal bodyguard once they had sufficient training in their new abilities," Lionel replied in a moment of rare honesty, "however if they should show aptitude in other areas, Luthor Corp is always looking for promising employees."

That was one of the things he could say safely about his father. He never let any potential resource go to waste and always managed to find a use for people, even if it ended up being a sacrificial lamb.

"I already have a construction crew working on the mansion to make it more suitable and the foreman assures me it should be complete by the end of the week." His father picked a folder off of his desk and handed it to him, "And I expect you to be there to welcome the new tenants before you evaluate the fertilizer plant."

"Fine," he said, knowing that if his father was willing to put this much effort into the second venture, he'd have leverage waiting in the wings to make sure he went along with it.

This appeared to surprise his father but the look quickly left his face to be replaced with his usual overlord look. It didn't affect him the way it no doubt affected others. Now, though, was coming the moment of departure and he would not allow his father to have the last word to claim victory this time around.

In this case, the best parting shot he could deliver was to leave without being dismissed and to completely ignore his father's existence.

So he did.

_**Four Days Later, Driving Down Main Street, Smallville, Afternoon, Xander's P.O.V **_

_I might not be a lifelong resident of Smallville but even I can see that things have changed around here._ Xander thought as he drove Uncle Jonathan's pickup truck.

Indeed it had been only four days since the incident that people were beginning to refer to as the 'Big Bang' but already he could see changes throughout the small Town. People were looking at other with a hint of mistrust in their eyes, a mistrust born of knowing that the people walking down the street next to them could have superhuman abilities but possessing no outward sign of it. Even being someone who'd lived in Smallville all their lives didn't seem to help lessen the suspicion being cast between everyone. It hadn't gotten bad enough that people were attacking each other on the streets but that could mostly have to do with the government placing a unit in the center of town in what used to be a movie theater called The Talon. The whole place just screamed government and he'd spotted no less than ten new camera emplacements around town that looked like they were top of the line. It was why he was using the pickup truck rather than just using his super speed to go from place to place. While the fact that he hadn't been picked up yet proved that normal cameras couldn't provide a clear picture of him at superhuman speed, he was worried that these new ones could. Aunt Martha and Uncle Jonathan also thought that as well, which was why they let him borrow the truck since he had his driver's license.

He was just in town to deliver a few baskets of vegetables to a local general store and maybe pick up a few things but from the atmosphere everyone was giving off he'd do his best to get it all done quickly. The town of Smallville had gone from a nice, quaint little town that he thought he could get to like and changed into something a lit powder keg with an invisible fuse. His legal guardians tried to convince him that everything would go back to normal in a month's time but he had a feeling that nothing would ever be able to make things go back to the way they'd been. Too much had changed, some of it good but some of it bad, and time only went in one direction.

Seeing the general store getting closer, he hit the turn signal and pulled into the only available parking spot with as much care as he could. After all, this wasn't his truck and the last thing he needed was for Uncle Jonathan to get mad at him because he damaged it. Getting out, he pulled the list out of his pocket to check to see what the store got before picking up the first basket of produce.

"Hey Xander!" came a voice he had blissfully been free of since the Big Bang but now it appeared he was back on **her** radar.

Turning around, he found that the identity he'd paired with the voice was right on the money because walking up to him with a smile on her face was none other than Chloe Sullivan, intrepid reporter for a high school newspaper. Putting on his best friendly smile, he hoped that she was just coming at him with a bit of fellow student chit chat rather than an interview. It wasn't that he didn't like the blonde but he believed the phrase 'the people have a right to know' had a little too much control over her sometimes. He agreed that people deserved to know about things that would affect their lives but he didn't believe that such knowledge should come at the cost of innocent peoples' lives.

"Hey, Chloe! What're you doing here?"

"Just picking up a few groceries for my Dad. You?"

"Dropping off some stuff from Uncle Jonathan but I think I'll be heading back to the farm as soon as I can," he said, looking at the people on the sidewalks. "There are some seriously bad vibes rolling around town today."

"I know what you mean. I keep thinking I'll turn a corner to find someone being burned at the stake," Chloe stated, making her own dislike of the state of affairs known. "It's like everyone's forgotten that they're glaring at the same people they've lived with for years."

"Yeah," he said, wondering how Chloe would react if she knew about his powers. "People are stupid like that."

"What're your thoughts on the madhouse this place has become?" she asked, acting more like the reporter he knew her to be.

"It's going to be a while before things get back to anything resembling normal. Kinda like Sunnydale, Smallville's been pretty much free of the whole super powers and mutant mess the rest of the world is so obsessed with. Now that we have neighbors and friends in that category, we're going to find out the hard way who the intolerant bigots are and who has the brainpower to see past the differences."

It was true that he figured lines would be drawn soon between those who could see past differences and those who focused only on the differences. He knew where Aunt Martha and Uncle Jonathan stood, as well as himself, but as for everyone else he was still playing the waiting game. He'd wait and see how they behaved both in class as well as around town to see what sort of people they were inside. He hoped that they weren't like some of those anti-mutant bigots or else life in Smallville was going to get seriously volatile in the weeks to come.

"Then I guess it'll be up to us to enlighten the masses!" Chloe said as a smile broke out on her face.

"Us? What do you mean us?" he asked, puzzled by what she'd just told him.

"Well… The Torch lost about a third of its employees to the Big Bang and I've been promoted to run the whole thing, so I need to fill positions. So I figured that since you might want to get in Principal Kwan's good books, you might want a job with the school newspaper. If you… want to, that is?" she asked, now sounding more than a little awkward about it.

It was not something he'd initially planned on doing but, after a few seconds of consideration, he could already see some of the benefits of working at the Torch. For one thing, while it might not have the connections the official town paper had, he had a feeling that if anything unusual or interesting happened, Chloe would be one of the first people to find or she knew who to ask for info. Considering how things were likely to go in the weeks to come, he had no doubt that he'd need to stay on top of things to keep damage to a minimum. Plus the blonde reporter did have a point that a positive position in the school newspaper would go a long way to repairing his rep and getting it away from 'punk kid who had his nerdy friend tweak his grades'. At least those were the words Principal Kwan's gossip mongering secretary had said were written in his official record by Snyder.

"Sign me up." he said with his trademark smile, "Can't guarantee I'll be putting out Pulitzers every issue but I'll do what I can."

"Not a problem!" Chloe said with a smile as bright as the sun, "Just try to make your deadlines and we'll call it even."

"No problem. Look, I've got to make a few more deliveries but I'll spin by the Torch later, alright?" he asked, taking note of the time and how many more stops he needed to make.

"See you then!" she said before walking away.

With that meeting pleasantly ended he resumed his drop off of the produce with the general store before getting back into the pickup truck and pulling back into traffic.

It took about two hours to finally finish making all the deliveries and, with them done, he began to head back into town since the last delivery had been out in the county. He was just about to pass by the last bridge before hitting Smallville proper when he noticed something that had him bring the truck to a complete stop. The railings halfway across the left side of the bridge were broken and completely bent outwards, as though something heavy had rammed right into it. Add to that the roll of barbed wire and pieces of black tire rubber he saw littering the road it left a very troubling sequence of events in his mind.

Running over to the broken section of the railing, he could see bubbles rising up from the churning water that all but confirmed what he'd deduced. Without thought he dove into the water and searched for the vehicle he knew had gone off the road and into the river. While not an excellent swimmer due to his anemia, he was still good enough to control which way he went underwater, thus he followed the bubbles and soon found the car. Moving around to where he figured the driver's side was, he soon spotted a young man who looked to be in his early to mid-twenties but the guy was unconscious from the looks of things. Reaching for the door handle, he pulled back on it as much as he could only to have the thing come off in his hand. Throwing it to the side, he grabbed the side of the door and pulled for all his worth and finally things went his way as the entire door came off in his hands. Moving it to the side, he reached in, unbuckled the seatbelt and pulled the young man free of the car.

Swimming to the surface was much harder now that he was essentially carrying dead weight but he refused to let the young man in his arms go. His lungs weren't complaining yet and, if he was right he'd be able to get to the surface of the river before it got to that point. Once he got his footing on the shores of the river he was able to move much more easily and left the water completely. Laying the young man on the ground, he was able to get a better look at him now and gazed upon the odd sight that the guy was completely bald. At first he thought the guy might be one of those neo-Nazi types who shaved their head but he could see not so much as single sign if impending hair growth. Usually, even if you shaved your head, you could still see pinpricks of hair poking out of the top of the head but this was completely barren.

Shaking his head to clear it, he immediately went about checking the guys vitals and was concerned to find that the man was neither breathing and had no pulse. Almost immediately he began to administer CPR but carefully, since he didn't know what sort of internal injuries the guy might have. This turned out to be the correct course of action since he felt a rib straining beneath his hands and immediately reduced the strength. For a time he thought that he was too late and the guy was beyond reviving but then without warning the form before him took a gasp of air. Easing the man on his side, he watched as water was spat and choked out of the formerly dead man's mouth but that came to a stop as the cracked rib made its presence known.

"Easy! You've got a banged up rib," he said as he tried to keep the man's movement down to a minimum. "Rest here while I try to find a phone to call an ambulance."

"R-right…pocket. Cell phone," said the twenty-something young man.

Not knowing if the cell would work after being submerged, he decided it was at least worth a try since he had no clear idea of where the nearest phone would be. Flipping the device open, he was gratified to see that it appeared to be in working order and immediately dialed 911.

_Here's hoping the ambulance responds faster than they did back in Sunnydale!_ He thought as he put the phone to his ear.

_**Smallville General Hospital, One Hour Later, Jonathan Kent's P.O.V**_

_What has Xander gotten himself into this time?_ Jonathan thought as he strode quickly through the halls of the hospital.

He had only gotten the call about twenty minutes ago and it had taken him this long to get to the hospital without his pickup truck. Now he was reviewing the facts he'd been told by Sheriff Miller when he'd called the Kent farm while at the same time keeping an eye out for the young man who'd begun to grow on him in the last week. According to Ethan there'd been a car accident out by the old Reeves Bridge and that Xander had dove into river to save the driver. It'd been a close call but his nephew had managed to rescue the driver and revive him with CPR before calling for an ambulance. Ethan had said that Xander hadn't been hurt but had insisted on accompanying the car crash victim to the hospital just to be sure that the man was going to be okay. He had smiled at that news as it fit with what he'd learned of the teenager's personality but that smile had quickly faded when the Sheriff had let slip who the driver of the vehicle had been.

Lex Luthor.

That had been enough to get him to call around for a ride to the hospital until he finally called Nell and got her to come over and pick him up. He knew that Martha hadn't been happy about that despite the neutral face she'd had on but she had to realize that whatever relationship he had with his ex-girlfriend, it was nothing more than friendship now. He'd told her countless times, whenever he'd wound up spending too much time with Nell, but she always got the same look no matter how much he tried to reassure her. In the end he'd just come to accept the fact that there would always be a certain level of friction between the two women and just did all he could to keep it to a minimum. He'd kept the talk between him and Nell neutral on the way over, only to arrive five minutes ago with her saying she'd wait if needed. However he'd fortunately spotted his pickup truck and, after pointing it out to Nell, told her he'd drive home himself. She'd given him the same look she'd used to when things didn't go her way but without a pretext for sticking around she left as he'd wished.

Now, though, he'd have to do his best to discreetly get Xander away from Lionel Luthor's kid as quickly as possible. While he applauded his nephew's actions in saving the young man, he didn't want the teenager to get entangled with that family if it could be avoided. He remembered all too well how the elder Luthor conned or swindled various landholders around Smallville out of their property or tricked them into signing contracts that were written to favor him completely. He didn't even want to think about the less than legal ways that Lionel Luthor had acquired certain things but he was sure that if the police ever found out, the corporate shark would be imprisoned until judgment day. While he hadn't had the displeasure of meeting the younger Luthor, he doubted that the apple had fallen very far from the tree.

Turning the final corner, he came upon Xander looking through the window of one of the rooms where one Lex Luthor was being treated. "Xander!"

The youth turned immediately and smiled in welcome before taking a few steps away from the window. "Uncle Jonathan? What are you doing here?" Xander asked, looking a bit puzzled at the presence of the Kent patriarch.

"What am I doing here? I got a call from Sheriff Miller that you'd saved someone from drowning," he replied as though it were obvious why he'd come so swiftly. "I was concerned about you, Xander. Are you alright?"

"I'm fine. A little wet but changed into some clothes you had in the back of the pickup," he said. indicating the set of clothes he was wearing. "I just want to make sure that Lex is okay before I headed home."

_Lex? I'm not so sure I like the sound of that._ He thought as he found it awfully familiar of the teen to refer to someone he'd just met by his first name.

"I'm sure he'll be fine. Smallville General might not have everything hospitals in the big cities have but the doctors are every bit as good," he reassured the teenager in the hopes of luring him away. "He'll be fine as long as he listens and does what he's told."

"I wouldn't count on it, Mr. Kent," came a cocky voice that could only belong to a Luthor. "My family isn't exactly known for doing what they're told."

Turning, he spotted a bald twenty-something young man. He could see that there was some discomfort but the arrogant pride that seemed to be inseparable from the Luthor family made it barely perceivable. Not wanting to make this an even bigger mess than it already was, he put his best polite face on.

"I'm all too familiar with that," he stated doing his best to keep his voice neutral.

"Yes, I'm sure you are. In any case, I just wanted to thank Xander for his help," Lex said with what he supposed was meant to be genuine gratitude. "If it wasn't for him, I'd likely be dead right now."

"I just did what came natural," Xander stated, looking a bit uncomfortable at the gratitude he was receiving. "Besides, I'm sure anyone else would have done the same thing."

While he didn't like the Luthors, he had to agree with his nephew that the people of Smallville were decent enough that they would have done the same had one of them come upon the accident site. Unlike the Luthor family, people who lived in Smallville didn't have limitless amounts of money or luxurious homes, but rather had to earn everything they had through hard work and friendship. They knew that in this world it was necessary to lean upon each other and help each other out when things became too difficult to handle for one person alone. For people like Lex and Lionel, everyone else was probably nothing more than stepping stones for them on their way to acquire greater levels of power or wealth.

Such people disgusted him to no end.

"Maybe. Still, if there's anything I can do to repay you, just let me know," Lex said, extending a hand that Xander didn't hesitate to shake firmly.

"He'll call you," he said before covertly pulling Xander away from the man and towards the parking lot of the hospital.

Without another word he picked up the pace as soon as he was sure they were out of the younger Luthor's sight, since he didn't want to spend any more time in the young man's presence than he had to. He only got to the escalator before Xander yanked his arm free and he knew he would have to explain his actions sooner or later.

"Okay, while I'm all for male bonding, would you mind explaining why we had to walk away from Lex like he was a Leper or something?" Xander asked, sounding like he'd be quite annoyed if he didn't get a decent answer.

"The Luthor family doesn't have the best of reputations in Smallville. For over a decade they've been swindling people out of their land and tricking them into deals that reduced them to near poverty. Friends I've worked with for years have lost everything! All because of the Luthors!"

"Okay! I get that Lex and his dad have caused quite a few problems in Smallville but it's probably been mostly Luthor senior that's been making the calls," Xander said, sounding a little irritated but at the same time understanding. "Think about it. Lex's dad is the C.E.O of Luthor Corp, right? If Big Daddy Luthor is as bad as you say he is then what're the chances he's giving Lex any say in things at all?"

That thought stopped him before he could go further to tell his nephew precisely what he thought of the Luthor family. It was a grudging point but a point nonetheless. Lionel Luthor was a ruthless businessman who did whatever was necessary to get what he wanted and didn't like sharing one little bit. While there was a possibility that he might give his son some power, it was more likely that Lionel would keep the lion's share for himself while throwing only bread crumbs to everyone else. If that was the case, Lex's only guilt was by association and perhaps not caring about the blood that was soaked into every hundred dollar bill he had. He didn't like that but, at the same time, he had to admit that perhaps he should give the younger Luthor the benefit of a doubt for the time being. If **he** was right it'd only be a matter of time before Lex did something to prove he was no better than his father. However, if Xander was right, then any undue prejudice would push the twenty-something Luthor towards his father's way of doing things.

He couldn't let himself do that.

"I guess you're right," he allowed grudgingly as the doors opened on the ground floor. "Just… just be careful around the Luthors. Lionel's had two decades to influence Lex and poison his son's mind with his way of thinking."

"I'll be careful but if who a person was raised by had that much influence over who they were when they grew up, then I'd be stuck in a bottle like Tony was most of the time." Xander said as he quickly strode away from the elevator towards the parking lot.

It took until his nephew stepped out into the sun for him to get over the revelation that the teenager had been raised by a drunk. He wasn't sure how to react and more or less strode up to the front doors on auto-pilot but hopefully by the time they got back to the farm, he'd have his head on straight enough to speak.


	4. The Aftermath of Change

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the copyrighted material contained herein. They are the rightful property of their respective creators and associated companies. I make no money off of this whatsoever and have no intention of changing that within my lifetime. I write fanfics because it is fun and because there are those who enjoy reading my work. Therefore if you are considering filing a lawsuit against me I would recommend against it because whatever money you get from me won't cover even half your legal fees.

_**The Top of the Kent Farm Driveway, Thirty Minutes Later, Willow's P.O.V**_

_Where's Sunnydale denial syndrome when you need it?! _Willow thought as she walked down the dirt road with a backpack full of schoolbooks.

She never thought she'd be wishing for the mental fog that had kept so many people back home from seeing and accepting the supernatural. Now, though, with all that had happened, she wanted it if only to make keeping her own skills in the arcane arts a secret that much easier. Back home she'd been able to practice just about anywhere with a bit of discretion but now… now the only place she dared do anything magical was in her bedroom when her Aunt Nell was out. She'd found a hidey hole for her books the very day that they arrived in the mail and it was in such an inconspicuous area of her room that the only way they'd be found was if she screwed up somehow.

She was extra careful in making sure that didn't happen.

However other people couldn't keep their **unique** nature a secret so easily. She'd already seen three people who'd had their physical bodies changed by the gas and she'd seen how those who hadn't been touched by the gas had looked at those that had. So far she'd seen a guy with completely green skin and hair with what she thought were fangs occasionally sticking out of his lower jaw, a guy with silver skin as well as solid white eyes and a girl with silver skin along with ink black hair. All the ones she'd been able to spot had done their best to wear concealing clothes but, in a town like Smallville, that just made them stand out more. School would be starting up again from what she'd heard and, unless they were planning on springing it on the student body tomorrow morning, there weren't any new rules about those that'd gained powers. She guessed that, for the time being, the Smallville school board was going to try and let things go on like normal.

She doubted it'd last.

One of the side benefits of being the daughter of a pair of psychologists was that she had a better idea of how people thought than most girls her age. It'd only be a matter of time before prejudice and bigotry started influence both the students as well as their parents. The students would probably fire words like 'freak' or 'mutie' at them and those changed would either scurry away or retaliate. The parents would probably buy into the hype the media often had on or they'd hear questionable tales from their kids. In the end, unless something was done to convince everyone that the two groups could co-exist, it'd be segregation all over again. She'd be able to keep her magic a secret easily enough since there weren't any easy spells that she could accidentally fire off if someone startled her. Xander, on the other hand…

_He'll probably want to play superhero every chance he gets,_ she thought, fighting the urge to roll her eyes.

It'd been a serious surprise when she'd paid an unannounced visit to the Kent Farm and seen her friend blurring from one end to the other faster than her eyes could follow. She wasn't a complete stranger to superhuman speed, given how she'd seen Buffy move while fighting vampires but, compared to how fast Xander had been going, the blonde Slayer might as well have been standing still. She'd been shocked speechless until her best friend and his Uncle noticed her but then she might very well have broken her old record for most words spoken in a minute. It'd taken a while for her to calm down but she'd gotten the whole story and heard Xander's theory about what he was.

A mutant.

It certainly fit with what she knew and nothing else she could think of fit with the super speed he'd been moving at when she'd arrived. She'd found it odd that he hadn't gotten his powers sooner since, according to some of the more objective articles she'd read, a mutant's powers often activated when under significant emotional distress. Considering what they'd been doing since Buffy first arrived, she'd have thought that his super speed would have popped up after Jesse died or Xander's first encounter with a vampire. She'd been puzzling over the conundrum ever since but the best she could figure was that the demonic energy that the Hellmouth gave off somehow kept the chemical reaction that would have activated the powers in check. Now that they were both away from Sunnydale, whatever impediment had been in place must have worn off and the stress of the bank robbery must have been the trigger.

That was her theory at the moment and, until she came across something better, she'd stick to it.

In any case, she focused her mind on the reason why she was there and that was to give her best friend an academic kick in the pants before classes resumed. He'd been lucky so far with their first few days being meet-and-greet and then the days following being spent either in the hospital or doing chores for the Kents. Unless something big happened in the next while, it'd be normal classes with tests and assignments every few weeks. While she'd had no trouble with schoolwork, she knew Xander wasn't the most dedicated student and often, without some prodding from her, he'd be satisfied with barely passing grades. While that might be fine for such a laid back person as Xander, she didn't want her best friend to be stuck with a minimum wage job while living out of a barely sanitary closet of an apartment. In order to prevent that, she'd committed herself to pushing him to apply himself to his studies whenever she could spare the time from her own. She'd already looked through the first six chapters of each of her text books and felt she had a strong enough grasp of the material that she'd need no more than a refresher to pass any of the tests.

She was almost at the house when she heard the sounds of a truck turning onto the road. Turning around, she was a little surprised to see Xander and Mr. Kent driving up the dirt road in their red pickup truck. According to what Xan said on the phone last night, he only had a few chores and some deliveries to make before he'd be free for whatever she wanted to do. He should have been back an hour ago.

_I wonder what held him up?_

It wasn't until they were almost at a stop before she got a clear look at them inside the car and then she knew something had happened. Xander had a look on his face that he only showed whenever he'd let something slip that he hadn't meant to. A secret he wouldn't want to talk to anyone but her about but that was only secrets that involved… his adoptive parents. She sighed as she realized the funk her friend would be in now and probably would be in the mood for studying any time soon. She could try to cheer him up but she figured the best cure for him right that moment would be some time to himself. With that in mind she moved to intercept Mr. Kent. who looked like he was about ready to prod some answers out of his nephew.

"Xander! Wait!" Mr. Kent said before breaking off as she got in his way, "Willow? Wha—?"

"I know you have questions. Mr. Kent. but right now Xander needs his space." she said firmly, her resolve face on.

The farmer looked like he'd argue the point but eventually he proved to everyone just how much like Xander he was by caving under her glare. She waited until a couple of minutes had passed and she was sure that Xander had enough lead time that his Uncle wouldn't have an easy time guessing where he was. Stepping out of the older man's path, she decided that it'd probably be best if she went back to Nell's place until later on in the day. He'd be better by then and perhaps a little more receptive to her academic prodding.

Before she left, though, she'd give Mr. Kent a small hint of what was bothering Xander to act as an extra incentive to leave her friend alone.

"The only thing I can tell you is this: Xander's made a promise to himself to be a better man than Tony Harris could ever hope to be."

She hoped Mr. and Mrs. Kent would give him his space until he was ready to tell them the whole story about the Harris household. Or maybe he wouldn't tell them ever.

She was fine with that too.

_**Smallville High School, Mr. Brand's Biology Class, First Period, Xander's P.O.V**_

_Well isn't __**this**__ a cheerful classroom!_ Xander thought sarcastically as he looked about the room filled with looks of fear, anxiety or prejudice.

It was the first day of classes since the 'Big Bang' incident and it was his first class of the day, but already it felt like a powder keg that had a lit match dangling over it. He'd had a faint hope that he'd be able to go back to classes as though nothing had happened but, if the first class was any indication, uncertainty was about to become the key word of the entire school year. In a move that hadn't really surprised him, the school had apparently decided to allow the students that had been changed by the gas to attend classes like normal. There were only three in his class that he could spot and he didn't think there'd be too many elsewhere, considering the high fatality rate of those who'd been exposed, but those that did exist were in for a rough time. Looking about, he decided he'd best mark out who the changed people were since they might wind up in the same boat if someone spotted him using his super speed. The first was a gray skinned girl with ink black hair who seemed to have a goth schoolgirl look going on and was doing her best not to make it obvious she was being watchful for hostile movement. He could even spot little bits of energy occasionally rising in and out of her hands but it looked like she always managed to force them back under her skin when they got too noticeable. He was glad that she'd been able to gain some control over her abilities in the short time since she'd gotten them. That control probably wouldn't hold up if she got too agitated but hopefully the rest of the student body would have brains enough to know when to back off.

The next was a guy… or at least he thought it was a guy, but it was kind of hard to tell for certain considering that he was bundled up in such a way to hide his face completely. Since he'd entered the room, he'd only caught glimpses of green skin and maybe some green hair but that was about it. If he ever got the chance, though, he'd have to tell the guy that he was probably doing the opposite of what he'd intended, which was to hide his changes. By doing everything he could to conceal his changes, he was pretty much telling everyone that he was one of the ones to be physically changed in such a way so as to stand out in a crowd. Then again, if the changes were severe, even some slapped on face paint and hair dye wouldn't be enough to keep people from staring.

The last person that he could identify as being native American, female, and in no way bothered by the opinions of others if the look on her face was anything to go by. According to the roll call that Mr. Brand just called, her name was Sarah Rainmaker and, according to rumors, she'd been in town visiting relatives at the local Kawatche tribe reservation when the gas hit. The tribe itself hadn't been touched but Sarah had been driving into town on an errand and had been caught up in the cloud before losing control and driving into the ditch. He wasn't sure of the details about why she was still in the Smallville but there were any number of good and bad reasons out there. He didn't quite know what her powers were but he had suspicions that it had something to do with electricity considering the black spots on her metal bracelet.

If there were any others, they were likely human in appearance and had powers that were more subtle than anything that could be perceived with the naked eye.

"Principal Kwan has asked me to make a few things clear to you before we begin the class. The rest of the school is getting the same speech," Mr. Brand said in a firm voice that would not tolerate inattention. "As I'm sure most of you are aware some of your fellow classmates as well as a few people passing through were exposed to the gas cloud that came from the direction of the highway. Many died but we are fortunate that many survived. Those that lived apparently now possess varying powers much like mutants.

"HOWEVER let me make it clear that they are **not** mutants. Unlike mutants, they do not possess the x-gene that is the source of the powers mutants like the terrorist Magneto," Mr. Brand explained while looking firmly at a few normal students in the room. "Their powers are nothing more than the random result of the gas' interaction with their bodies' unique body chemistry. They could have just as easily died. They are also the same people they were before where it counts. Therefore Principal Kwan wants to make it clear that **any** student reported behaving in a prejudiced or racist manner towards the affected students will be disciplined. How severely will depend on the nature of the incident reported. There will be **no** exceptions."

This was met with mixed reactions but the scales were definitely tilted in favor of the normal students, who didn't like that they would be watched from this day forward.

"So basically what you're saying is that we have to 'play nice' with the freaks?" asked one student wearing a jock letter jacket.

_There's one idiot in every crowd!_ he thought as mutterings with similar sentiments began to rise among the other students.

"I am **asking** you to be aware that there will be consequences to your actions," Mr. Brand said sounding displeased at the name calling. "You're all entitled to your opinions about mutants and those with superhuman abilities but any attempt to harass or harm students at this school because of them will not be tolerated. Not by me and not by Principal Kwan. Now let's get on with today's lesson. Please open your text books to chapter three."

With that his fellow classmates seemed to quiet down for the most part and things settled into something resembling a normal class. He still caught a few cases of some jocks to social elite giving dirty looks to the three empowered people but those people seemed reluctant to do more in Mr. Brand's presence. Whether they'd have the sense to wait until they were off school property before trying anything was another matter. Personally he foresaw many bathroom or locker room ambushes in the future, so he made a mental note to be more observant in the hallways. While he didn't want his own powers to become widely known, he wasn't about to let certain athletic assholes or bitchy beauties have their way with the newly empowered students. He'd try to talk them into breaking up whatever they wind up trying to do but if that failed… he'd take whatever hits he had to in order to protect an innocent.

The rest of the classes up until lunch hour went pretty much the same, with only one more empowered person being spotted by his eyes, and he knew this guy would be trouble. His name was Chris Carter and while he didn't have a good enough handle on the guy's powers, they seem to be energy based. He could see occasional bursts of green energy from the asshole's fingers and eyes as the bastard tried to spook the students around him, as well as the teacher. However he didn't know whether the energy could be used to destroy or manipulate the world around Chris but he had a feeling that the jerk's control was only basic at best. If the idiot got angry or decided to bite off more than he could safely handle, things could become seriously complicated in Smallville. He'd be one helluva hand grenade to deal with.

He did his best to put Carter out of his mind so he could focus on what the teacher was saying but it was clear that the brunette bastard wanted to be the center of attention.

It was a small mercy when the bell for lunch came and everyone went to do whatever they usually during the lunch period. He, of course, went to his locker to get his homemade lunch before heading to the usual picnic table that he and Willow had claimed as their table. While it was true that Smallville High School did have a library, he somehow doubted that there'd be a stuffy Brit librarian there and it just wouldn't seem right spending time there without one.

He had taken his first step outside the building when he spotted something that just screamed trouble.

Standing not far from the picnic table that he usually used with Willow was one Whitney Fordman but across from him, leaning up against a tree, was Chris Carter, looking as cocky as he had in class minutes ago. He couldn't hear everything that was going on but it was looking like a fight between egos that'd turn real ugly since he doubted that either of them would care about the consequences to laying their opponent completely out. Normally he wouldn't mind seeing two testosterone-crazed idiots go at it but, with Carter involved, there was a high chance that things would get messy. The sane thing to do at this point would be to go get a teacher to try and break things up but the time it might take to do so could be enough time for things to take a turn for the worse.

There was only one thing that might work out.

_Looks like I'm going to be sent back to the hospital in the near future, _he thought with a roll of his eyes as he walked towards the two cavemen. _Sometimes I wonder just how long a life I'm going to live with this damned White Knight complex of mine!_

He was halfway there when he began to hear the conversation between the two dickheads and his concerns about an impending throw down was quickly justified.

"What's your problem, Carter?!" asked Whitney, who sounded quite irritated at the moment.

"Oh, nothing much, jock," Chris replied with an irritating level of nonchalance. "Just wondering what you'll be doing once I've knocked you down to the bottom of the social ladder here at Smallville High. After all, why would anyone want to hang with you when they can spend time with the next Big Man in School."

"Damn freak! You think that just 'cause you got some flashy powers you can just do whatever you want!" Fordman growled as he took a step forward, "No **fuckin**' chance!"

"Oh? And just what do you plan on doing about it?" Carter asked, letting some green energy flash in his eyes. "I could kill you in a second and be long gone before anyone could so much as lecture me."

"Try it!" Whitney challenged with his right hand clenching into a fist, no doubt in preparation to deliver a punch.

"Let's not and say we did," he said as he got between the two cavemen. "I'm about to eat my lunch and blood really spoils my appetite. Can't have that with a delicious ham and cheese sandwich waiting for me."

"Butt out of this, Harris!" Whitney said grabbing the tenant of the Kent Farm by the shirt. "This doesn't concern you!"

Reaching up he grabbed the man's hand by the fingers and firmly pulled them off his shirt.

At least that was his intention but instead he watched as Whitney almost cried out in pain at the strength of the grip and this fact immediately caused him to release the hand. Not knowing what was going on but knowing he had to come up with some reason for it before people started coming up with their own.

"I take my clothes very seriously, Fordman," he said in a no nonsense tone of voice that hopefully implied that he'd put all his strength into pulling the offending hand free. "And like I said: blood ruins the meal. So why don't you two just go find a more civilized way to deal with your issues."

With a bit of luck Whitney and everyone else will just assume that he used the maximum of normal human strength to free himself and wouldn't suspect the truth that he was beginning to suspect. He had barely put any real strength into his hand when he'd grabbed Whitney's, nothing more than he'd use to turn a doorknob, but it'd looked like he'd been trying to break the jock's fingers with one hand. He knew from his soldier memories that it was possible to snap those bones just using one hand but he didn't have the brute strength necessary for such a thing.

Or at least he thought he didn't.

"Yeah, I guess that would be the smart thing to do," Carter said, sounding like the idea of pounding on Whitney had lost its appeal. "So I think I'll see if the cafeteria has anything edible to eat. See you around, car man!"

With that the arrogant asshole strode away like he was king of the castle and wanted everyone to know it.

_That guy's definitely going to be trouble,_ he thought as he resumed his walk to the picnic table without looking in Whitney's direction.

Just one more thing added to the plate of problems he had to deal with.

_**Kent Farm, After School, The Back Field, Martha Kent's P.O.V**_

_He's been at it for an hour already._ Martha thought as she looked in the same direction she'd seen Xander go after he dropped his book bag off on the front porch. _What could he be doing?_

It was something that she'd been thinking about but hadn't been able to come up with anything beyond wild theories or speculation. Whatever the case she was beginning to worry about what the truth could be so with one final look at tonight's supper she decided to put an end to the question. Walking out the back door she made her way at a leisurely place she kept her eyes open for any sign of her nephew while part of her mind kept track of anything that might need fixing. It took about fifteen minutes but eventually she spotted the messy head of black hair near the area where Jonathan usually piled up most of the larger pieces of trash that the farm produced before having it taken to the landfill. Broken pieces of wood, old engine parts and rocks that were discovered in the fields made up the majority of it. She wondered what he could be doing with junk so she picked up the pace a bit to see what was going on. She wasn't much more than five feet from him before she got her first clue in the form of a pile of crushed rock.

Was he angry for some reason and needed something to smash?

Looking up at his face, she could see no sign of anger or anything that would give rise to violence. In fact, it looked as though he was trying to figure something difficult out but kept making mistakes. Was he trying to figure out how to keep his super speed a secret with all of the new students at school with super powers? It would be considerably harder since everyone there would now be paying more attention to the odd things happening around Smallville High and looking at the people around them for signs that they weren't normal. So long as he made sure that she was far enough away from others before he used his speed it shouldn't be too hard. However she had a feeling it was something more than that. Xander wasn't the sort to get all worked up over such things so it had to be something else. Seeing him pick up a rock the size of a baseball she decided that it was useless to simply wonder and decided to ask him straight out.

"Xander? Is there something wrong?" she asked reaching up and placing a hand on his shoulder.

There was the sound that reached her ears as Xander's hand clenched automatically in surprise, crushing the rock in his hands like it was made from sand. This surprised her completely, enough to make her let go of the shoulder and take a step back. Xander turned around and she could see that he was trying to come up with some sort of way to explain what had happened without alarming her even more.

"Guess what I found out today?" Xander asked, presumably rhetorically, as he scratched the back of his head with nervous energy. "Looks like super speed isn't the only thing I have."

"What happened?" she asked as the debris on the ground took on a new significance.

Xander regaled her with how school went but, when it came to what happened during lunch, she saw the reason for his concern. He had tried to remove Whitney's hand gently but wound up nearly breaking it. Her nephew had come to the conclusion that he now possessed a degree of super strength to go with his super speed and had come out to the junk pile to get control of his new power. He wanted to learn to condition himself to just use enough strength to pass for normal rather than have to explain numerous accidents and destroyed property. She could see the reason in that since she could easily envision the different ways that super strength could lead to trouble during the run of a normal teenager's day.

"This is going to be a lot harder than super speed," Xander stated with some displeasure at the amount of work ahead of him. "Not running fast is easy compared to trying not to break someone's hand. How the hell am I going to learn control without taking a few days off from school!?"

"Xander! Language!" she reprimanded before thinking on the dilemma he was faced with. "We've got a couple of hours before supper and then the evening to work with. I'm sure if we work hard you can learn enough control to keep the number of accidents to a minimum."

"I hope so. I've seen some seriously bad attitudes in school so far and, if things flare up like they've done on TV, I don't want to be responsible for something like that happening in Smallville," Xander said a serious look appearing on his face. "I don't want anyone I know to get into trouble because of me."

While she wanted to reassure him that that wouldn't happen, she couldn't dismiss the possibility. She'd seen the same sort of news broadcasts and newspaper headlines about mutants, as well as how they were supposedly a 'menace to society'. Not that the media didn't have reasons for thinking that mutants were dangerous with the terrorists that existed, like that Magneto fellow, but they also had a habit of painting all mutants with the same brush. Instead of only pointing out those that had committed crimes, they were portraying every mutant as being a threat to ordinary people. Personally it reminded her of how people used to treat African Americans back when she was Xander's age. She had been against such behavior back then and she didn't like it now that it was being directed at people who were different through a fluke of genetics. In her mind it was the individual person who was good or evil not the powers themselves. Xander was proof in her mind that just being a mutant didn't automatically turn you into a menace to society or a 'Child of Satan', like that mutant hate group often called mutants.

Still, she could see how he'd be worried about sparking an anti-mutant incident at school.

"That won't happen. Xander, in the time that's passed since Jonathan and I took you into our home, you've proven yourself to be a kind and selfless young man," she said, trying to reassure the teenager. "Don't blame yourself for the ignorance and bigotry of others."

"I don't but I would blame myself if someone got hurt in all the commotion." Xander said, taking on a slightly more assertive position.

"If something like that does happen, then you'll just have to do your best to make sure no one gets hurt, won't you?" she asked rhetorically with a reassuring smile on her face.

"I guess so." Xander said with his own unique grin.

"Well, you keep practicing. I've got to get back to the house and check on supper," she said as she began to walk back to the house. "We'll work on your new power after that, okay?"

"Sure thing, Aunt Martha." Xander replied with a nod.

She turned fully towards the house and hoped that nothing had burned in her absence. Even if it did, though, it'd be for a good reason. Doing something for the sake of family was always the right thing to do.

_**Luthor Mansion, Outside of Smallville, That Evening, Lex Luthor's P.O.V**_

_This is turning out to be more interesting than I'd thought,_ Lex thought from his seat behind his desk as he sipped his drink.

When his father had first told him about what he'd be doing in Smallville, he'd seen it as the Lionel Luthor equivalent of making him sit in a corner for an hour. After all, he was Lex Luthor, son and heir of Lionel Luthor, so being put in charge of a fertilizer plant along with a dormitory for people with super powers really was beneath him. As far as he was concerned, if he wasn't the man running an important subsidiary of Luthor Corp, it wasn't a job fit for him. That was how he'd looked at the situation.

Now, though, he was beginning to find life in Smallville to be quite interesting especially the people who lived here.

A little over two thirds of the people that his father had extended invitations to had arrived at the mansion and had settled in. He'd met most of them but others would have to wait as the nature of their powers currently made them incapable of speech. The best example of that was one Cessily Kincaid, who was in a specialized lab/infirmary that his father had installed to see to the needs of the residents. According to the file he'd read, she'd been travelling along the highway when the gas cloud enveloped her vehicle, exposing she and her parents to its effects. Her mother and father hadn't survived and it was only with a bit of luck that the federal agents had noticed signs of intelligence in the mass of liquid metal in the back seat. The government agents had tried to help the former human girl into reassuming a more humanoid shape, as well as the ability to speak, but had only managed to loosely defined face and short sentences. His **father** had managed to put pressure on some parts of the government to get her transferred over to his custody and that had led to her being delivered, for want of a better word, to the mansion. He left the girl in the care of the three specialists that his father had hired for the specific purpose of caring for and developing the super powered teenagers. The first was Dr. Irene Adler, a psychologist and licensed therapist, who for obvious reasons was in charge of the mental wellbeing of the residents. It was the aged woman's opinion that the source of Cessily's in ability to take on a human form was more psychological than a flaw in the powers themselves. His geneticist and resident scientist was Dr. Jerry McGee and, while the man was determined to be thorough to the point of annoying, he hadn't yet been able to come up with a scientific reason for the girl's difficulties. Lastly the doctor for the mansion was one Dr. Anissa Pierce, who was a qualified surgeon but was skilled at handling less serious situations as well. With the three working together, he was confident that Miss Kincaid would be female formed and acting her age before too much longer. Dr. Adler projected at least a month, perhaps two, before any serious signs of progress would appear and then a session every other day to finish the job.

_Not an unreasonable amount of time, although I doubt my father would agree,_ he thought as he considered what sort of timeline Lionel Luthor would consider acceptable. _It'd be hard enough to get used to the idea of having super powers without having to deal with survivors guilt and a body that was about as far from being human as one could get._

He couldn't even imagine what it was like for the young lady so the best he could do was trust the opinions of the specialists and follow their advice.

The other residents had their own special needs but none of them were in situations quite as dire as Miss Kincaid's.

A young fourteen year old Garfield Logan was probably adjusting the slowest of the rest of the people living in the mansion at the moment but that was mostly due to his completely green body. While some body paint and a bit of caution would normally be enough to fix that, it was the true change to who he'd been that made such a solution futile. He'd only witnessed it personally once but the child of Mark and Marie Logan had the ability to shapeshift into a variety of animal forms with varying degrees of accuracy. In one case the young man had transformed into an eagle and, if it weren't for the feathers being different shades of green, he doubted anyone would be able to distinguish him from the real thing. Gar, as the kid asked to be called, could only hold the alternate shapes for ten minutes at most before he snapped back into human form. It was the basic consensus among the specialists that, with practice, the green teen could extend this period of time and perhaps retain an alternate form for a full hour. First, though, Dr. Adler would have to help Garfield overcome his self-loathing and desire to become a normal human again. Dr. McGee had theorized that it might be possible to reverse the effects of the gas in the future but that it would likely take years or decades of research for it to be done safely.

Next was Antonia Monetti, who quite frankly looked like a character from an old black and white film except with more silver than white. She was a little less shy when it came to her new appearance but she didn't advertise it in such a way that it'd provoke those who didn't have powers. Fifteen years old and, with her energy based abilities, she was showing signs of being able to form solid objects with the power she possessed. They were crude and unstable at the moment but were at times solid enough to touch, feeling no less real than his desk or car. According to camera's placed at strategic points throughout the mansion and on the surrounding grounds, she was practicing with her powers away from prying eyes.

Or so she thought.

There were a total of seven newly empowered teenagers living at the mansion with him and the specialists, with three more expected to arrive within the week, assuming they didn't find some way to escape his father's clutches. It wasn't impossible to do, as he'd learned himself, from time to time but it did usually require something of a hat trick.

_The sort of hat trick one might find in a being capable of saving half of a small town, perhaps,_ he thought as he clicked a few commands on his laptop to replay the video file his sources managed to sneak away from an Agent Sharon Carter.

It wasn't much, just a grid of four cameras from four separate security cameras scattered around the part of Smallville closest to the main highway. When someone first took a look at it, nothing could be seen but a cloud of gas seemingly moving out of the town of its own accord. However when you enhanced it and then looked at it frame by frame, you saw something completely different.

A blurred humanoid form moving so fast that, even with cutting edge technology, nothing could determine the identity of the person. Not their gender, their age or their ethnicity. The only things that they could determine was a rough estimate of the person's height and perhaps build but that was nowhere near enough. Still, it was his belief that, because Smallville was the first place this person chose to reveal him or herself, they must be a local resident. How long they were a resident he didn't know but it gave him a place to start and, with a little luck, the mysterious hero would make more appearances allowing him to gain more clues in the process. Once he determined who it was, he would do his best to form an alliance with that person and together they would have enough strength to make anything his father tried futile.

Futile enough that maybe he could finally step out of his father's shadow and forge his own path rather than walk down the one his father had laid out for him the day he was born.

_A dream, perhaps, but one I'm willing to do whatever I have to in order to make it a reality. _Lex smiled and took another sip of the liquid painkiller in his glass.

_**Abandoned Meat Packing Plant, Outside of Smallville, Two Days Later**_

_Not what I would have picked but I ain't complaining,_ thought the young man as he experiment with the powers that random chance had provided him with.

Watching as one of the four elements respond to his will, he couldn't help but feel a certain degree of pride in what he'd become. He already had the mind of a criminal thanks to his father but now… now he had the chance to not only to make his father proud but also to surpass him in the field of crime. However he wasn't a fool like some punks. He wasn't about to make his big debut until he was satisfied that he could control his newfound power with respectable skill. After all, everything had to be perfect and screw ups could not be tolerated no matter what.

He was **not** going back to Juvie!

He was going to make this the beginning of his new life, one where he soared to newfound heights, and death would follow in his wake.

Death for all those that had ever crossed him and those who'd dare to in the future.

And he knew just where to start.


End file.
